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Prisoners  of  War 

1861-65 

A    Record   of    Personal    Experiences,   and   a   Study   of    the 

Condition  and   Treatment  of  Prisoners  on   Both 

Sides  During  the  War  of  the  Rebellion 


By 
Thomas   Sturgis 

Late  1  st  Lieut.  57th  Regt. ,  Mass,  Vet.  Vols. ,  and  Aide-de-Camp  3rd  Brig.,  1  st  Div.  9th  A.  C. 


Reprinted  from  the  Report  of  an  Address  Delivered  Before  the 

N.  Y.  Commandery  of  the  Military  Order  of  the 

Loyal  Legion,  Feb.   1,   1911 


Illustrated 


G.    P.    Putnam's    Sons 

New  York  and  London 

3be  "Knickerbocker  press 

1912 


COPYRIGHT,   1912 

BY 
THOMAS   STURGIS 


ttbc  fmicfeerbocfcer  frees,  Hew  Jporfe 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

GUARD  AND  GUARD-HOUSE  AT  CAMP  MORTON   Frontispiece 

From  the  original  photograph  in  possession  of  the  Author 

VIEW    INSIDE    THE    PRISON   AT    CAMP    MORTON    SHOWING 

THE  AMPLE  SPACE  FOR  AlR  AND  EXERCISE  .  .       268 

From  the  original  photograph  in  possession  of  the  Author 

VIEW    INSIDE    THE     PRISON   AT    CAMP    MORTON   SHOWING 

THE  SUBSTANTIAL  AND  COMFORTABLE  BARRACKS  .      272 

From  the  original  photograph  in  possession  of  the  Author 

VIEW  INSIDE  THE  PRISON  AT  CAMP  MORTON  SHOWING 

THE  PRISONERS  SUPPLIED  WITH  BLANKETS        .         .     276 

From  the  original  photograph  in  possession  of  the  Author 

LIBBY  PRISON,  RICHMOND,  VA 280 

From  a  photograph  taken  April  6,  1865 

GARRISON  FLAG  OF  THE  LIBBY  PRISON    ....     286 

Photographed  from  the  flag  now  in  possession  of  Gen.  Edw.  H.  Ripley 

FACSIMILE  OF  THE  COVER  OF  THE  LIBBY  PRISON  ORDER 

BOOK    ........         .     290 

Photographed  from  the  original 

FACSIMILE  OF  THE  LETTER  OF  COL.  ROBERT  OULD,  C.  S.  A., 

AND  THE  KEY  OF  LlBBY  PRISON          ....       2Q2 

From  original  photographs.    The  Key  is  in  the  possession  of  Gen. 
Edw.  H.  Ripley 

iii 


iv  ILLUSTRATIONS 

SAMPLE  OF  COAL  LOADED  WITH  DYNAMITE      .         .         .     296 

From  the  original  photograph  in  possession  of  the  Author 

THE  INTERIOR  OF  DANVILLE  PRISON       ....     304 

From  a  drawing  by  Henry  Vander  Weyde 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR. 

READ  BEFORE  THE  NEW  YORK  COMMANDERY 
BY  COMPANION  LIEUT.  THOMAS  STURGIS,  FEBRUARY  i,  19x1. 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR. 

READ  BEFORE  THE  NEW  YORK  COMMANDERY 
BY  COMPANION  LIEUT.  THOMAS  STURGIS,  FEBRUARY  i,  1911. 

Commander  and  Companions  of  the  New  York  Commandery 
Loyal  Legion: 

OUR  Commander  has  asked  me  to  address  you  on  the 
subject  of  "Prisoners  of  War."  Remembering  my 
youth  at  the  time  of  the  War  of  the  Rebellion,  and 
the  modest  rank  I  attained  as  a  soldier,  I  should  hesitate  to 
obtrude  my  experiences  in  the  presence  of  the  many  older 
officers  of  high  rank  and  distinguished  service  who  sit 
around  us,  were  it  not  for  the  fact  that  my  army  life  in- 
cluded a  duality  of  events  connected  with  the  topic  of  the 
evening,  which  taken  together  form,  if  not  a  unique,  at  least 
an  unusual  combination. 

In  1864,  the  regiment  of  which  I  was  adjutant  was 
placed  on  guard  over  Camp  Morton  near  Indianapolis, 
Indiana,  then  one  of  the  largest  prisons  for  rebels  in  the 
North,  and  in  the  winter  of  1865  I  was  made  a  prisoner  at 
the  battle  of  Fort  Stedman  in  front  of  Petersburg,  Virginia, 
and  was  confined  in  the  well-known  Libby  Prison  at  Rich- 
mond. I  thus  had  the  opportunity  of  seeing  at  first  hand 
both  sides  of  this  much  mooted  question,  the  treatment  of 
prisoners.  The  facts  as  I  saw  and  experienced  them,  and 
the  conclusions  I  reached,  I  shall  try  to  give  you. 

I  listened  with  great  interest  to  the  addresses  on  this 
subject  delivered  to  us  last  December,  to  Companion  Read's 
eloquent  tribute  to  our  martyred  comrades,  and  to  Compan- 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  267 

ion  Putnam's  humorous  and  pathetic  story.  But  I  confess 
to  a  depression  of  spirit  as  I  listened.  When  Read  selected 
Camp  Morton  as  his  illustration  of  Northern  prisons,  and 
quoted  its  statistics  from  the  records  (though  not  as  a 
personal  experience),  and  when  Putnam  landed  at  Libby 
Prison,  I  felt  that  what  I  had  to  offer  had  been  in  some  degree 
anticipated.  You  will  understand  why  when  you  recall 
that  my  only  apology  for  accepting  our  Commander's 
suggestion  that  I  should  prepare  a  paper  on  "Prisoners  of 
War"  was  the  fact,  previously  stated,  that  I  had  seen  and 
known  both  sides  of  prison  life,  coupled  with  which  was  the 
further  fact  that  my  recollections  centred  around  the  two 
prisons  already  described.  Yet  as  there  is  always  some 
interest  in  a  personal  experience,  I  trust  you  will  bear  with 
fortitude  any  repetition  that  may  appear  in  my  accounts 
of  Camp  Morton  and  the  Libby  and  follow  me  into  the  wider 
field  which  I  have  tried  to  analyze  and  illustrate. 

Both  the  earlier  speakers  disavowed  the  intention  of 
oing  deeper  into  the  question  than  a  recital  of  the  suffering 
of  themselves  and  comrades,  but  I  think  the  occasion  is 
fitting  for  an  unimpassioned  and  judicial  review  of  the  facts 
as  they  tend  to  show  the  attitude  of  the  Southern  people 
upon  this  question,  and  the  intent,  purpose,  and  policy  of 
their  leaders  as  shown  by  the  Confederate  records  now  in 
our  possession.  I  speak  in  no  spirit  of  present  animosity. 
I  do  not  seek  to  place  upon  present  generations  responsi- 
bility for  the  acts  of  their  fathers.  Edmund  Burke  said: 
"I  should  not  know  how  to  draw  an  indictment  against  an 
entire  people, "  and  I  do  not  intend  to  do  so,  nor  is  it  needed 
here.  But  we  helped  to  make  history.  We  are  the  living 
witnesses.  We  are  rapidly  passing  away  from  this  scene, 
and  it  is  fitting,  in  the  interest  of  history,  in  justice  to  the 
way  our  people  conducted  the  war,  and  to  the  contrast  pre- 
sented by  the  actions  of  our  antagonists,  that  we  should 
leave  our  testimony  before  we  go. 

At  that  time  Indianapolis  was  a  crude  Western  town, 
giving  little  promise  of  its  present  importance,  except  to  the 
far-seeing  ones  who  appreciated  its  value  as  a  railroad  June- 


268  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

tion.  The  country  was  as  level  as  a  table,  the  streams 
flowed  sluggishly  with  hardly  fall  enough  to  move  their 
waters;  the  streets  were  wide,  unpaved,  and  dusty,  and  the 
buildings  of  wood,  low  and  insignificant.  The  soil  was  rich 
with  Nature's  centuries  of  fertilization,  and  the  timber  of 
white  oak,  walnut,  and  beech  was  magnificent.  Even  then, 
before  conservation  had  become  a  "progressive"  gospel, 
it  seemed  shocking  to  my  Yankee  sense  of  thrift  to  see  our 
men  felling  and  splitting  this  grand  timber  for  firewood. 

In  1864,  Indianapolis  was  a  live  wire.  Vallandigham 
was  openly  making  vehement  treasonable  speeches  in  the 
adjoining  State  of  Ohio.  He  had  organized  two  secret 
orders  of  very  militant  Southern  sympathizers,  with  a  large 
membership  in  Ohio,  Indiana,  Illinois,  and  Missouri.  Ken- 
tucky was  debatable  ground  overrun  alternately  by  both 
armies.  The  plan  of  making  a  military  movement  north- 
ward in  force  through  Ohio  and  Indiana  to  free  the  rebel 
prisoners  at  Camp  Johnson,  Ohio,  and  Camp  Morton, 
Indiana,  was  long  cherished  by  the  Confederacy.  These 
secret  orders  were  called  the  "Knights  of  the  Golden  Circle " 
and  the  "American  Knights,"  and  the  former  had  their 
headquarters  and  were  in  great  force  in  Indianapolis.  Oliver 
P.  Morton,  the  famous  war  governor,  was  in  office,  and  Gen- 
eral Alvin  P.  Hovey  was  in  command  of  our  troops.  Under 
him  Brigadier  General  Henry  B.  Carrington  commanded  the 
recruiting  and  draft  (or  conscript)  camp,  named  for  him,  and 
General  A.  A.  Stevens  commanded  Camp  Morton,  the  rebel 
prison  adjoining.  Carrington  became  well-known  subse- 
quently when,  as  Colonel  of  the  i8th  Regular  Infantry,  he 
commanded  at  the  time  of  the  "Fetterman  Massacre"  by 
the  Sioux  Indians  in  Wyoming  in  1866.  Stevens  was  an 
invalid  though  still  doing  duty. 

We  had  relieved  an  active  regiment  upon  our  arrival  and 
found  that  the  only  troops  remaining  were  part  of  a  regiment 
of  men  who  had  been  incapacitated  for  active  service  by 
wounds  or  disease  and  were  organized  for  guard  and  garrison 
duty.  The  Government  had  designated  the  troops  of  this 
character  as  the  "Invalid  Corps,"  and  they  wore  the  insignia 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  269 

"I.  C."  on  the  light  blue  uniforms  that  distinguished  them 
from  active  service  regiments.  These  letters  are  those 
placed  by  our  government  quartermasters  upon  useless 
animals  and  property  and  mean  simply  "inspected  and 
condemned."  The  rebels  soon  got  hold  of  the  identity  of 
lettering  and  promptly  christened  our  Invalid  Corps  "Con- 
demned Yanks."  The  epithet  was  used  so  publicly  and 
offensively  that  these  gallant  veterans  resented  the  stigma, 
and  the  Government  changed  the  title  to  "  Veteran  Reserves," 
by  which  they  were  afterward  known.  Upon  the  departure 
of  our  predecessors  my  regiment  was  placed  on  guard  over 
the  prison,  and  I  was  detailed  as  post-adjutant. 

Camp  Morton  was  originally  established  for  the  custody 
of  wounded  prisoners,  but  was  later  used  for  all  classes  of 
enlisted  men.  Its  site  had  a  slightly  rolling  surface,  as  well 
selected  as  the  topography  of  the  country  permitted. 
Colonel  Hoffman,  Commissary-General  of  Prisoners  at 
Washington,  reported  of  it  on  April,  23,  1863:  "It  is  a  very 
favorable  place  for  a  prison,  but  occupies  a  large  area.  It 
has  a  stream  of  water  running  through  it,  and  many  shade 
trees  standing."  It  was  enclosed  by  a  wooden  stockade. 
Surrounding  this  on  the  outside,  and  at  a  suitable  level  to 
enable  them  to  watch  the  interior,  was  the  platform  upon 
which  the  guards  were  stationed.  Inside  the  stockade, 
and  about  twenty  feet  from  it,  was  a  low  fence  which  the 
prisoners  were  forbidden  to  cross,  as  doing  so  would  have 
brought  them  to  the  foot  of  the  wall.  This  was  not  difficult 
to  scale  by  active  men  using  either  a  rude  ladder  or  a  long 
plank  torn  from  their  barracks.  Such  attempts  were  made 
several  times  during  our  stay.  They  were  made  at  night 
and  by  a  small  number  of  men,  probably  not  over  a  dozen 
at  a  time.  In  at  least  one  case  the  outbreak  was  successful. 
The  wall  was  scaled,  the  guard  overpowered,  and  several 
men  escaped.  The  surrounding  country  was  well  timbered, 
and  the  occupants  of  the  small  farms  were,  without  excep- 
tion, sympathizers  with  the  rebel  cause.  Concealment  and 
subsequent  escape  across  the  Ohio  River  were  therefore  easy. 
We  never  used  bloodhounds  to  track  fugitives  as  was  done 


2/O  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

in  the  South,  and  in  the  midst  of  a  population  friendly  to 
them  the  fugitives  could  not  have  been  identified.  Our 
men  escaping  from  Southern  prisons  picked  their  way  at 
night  for  weeks  together  through  a  hostile  country  where 
every  man  and  woman  was  an  enemy,  except  possibly  some 
timid  negro.  Swamps  were  their  beds  and  raw  corn  and 
berries  their  food.  The  prisoners  escaping  from  Camp 
Morton  found  food,  clothing,  shelter,  and  sympathy  at  every 
farm  they  approached.  I  have  spoken  of  the  inner  fence 
which  the  prisoners  could  not  cross.  There  was  no  need 
of  their  crossing  it,  as  will  appear  later,  for  their  necessities 
were  otherwise  cared  for,  but  it  was  not  a  "dead  line"  in 
the  sense  commonly  used.  In  these  instances  where  deter- 
mined attempts  to  break  out  were  made,  the  guards  of 
course  used  their  guns,  but  I  do  not  recall  an  instance  at 
Camp  Morton  where  a  prisoner  was  shot,  in  cold  blood, 
for  a  real  or  fancied  infringement  of  this  rule.  The  records 
of  the  adjutant-general's  office  show  several  such  cases  as 
having  occurred  at  other  prison  camps  in  the  North,  per- 
haps a  half  dozen  in  all.  Each  was  made  a  matter  of  close 
inquiry  by  a  duly  appointed  Board,  and  in  each  instance  the 
act  of  the  soldier  was  found  justified  by  the  orders  he  had 
received.  It  is  clearly  established  that  there  was  no  desire 
on  the  part  of  our  men  anywhere  or  at  any  time  wantonly  to 
take  a  prisoner's  life.  That  the  reverse  was  often  the  case 
in  the  Southern  prisons  is  unfortunately  well  attested,  but 
these  facts  and  the  feeling  that  led  to  them  will  be  given  and 
analyzed  farther  on. 

Within  the  enclosure  wooden  barracks  had  been  erected 
for  the  prisoners.  They  were  substantial  buildings  from  100 
to  1 20  feet  long  by  20  wide,  fully  enclosed  on  the  sides,  and 
well  roofed.  There  were  two  places  devoted  to  sinks.  Both 
were  wooden  buildings,  one  of  them  a  large  structure  in 
the  centre  of  the  camp,  and  both  had  seats  for  the  use  of  the 
men.  By  filling  in  with  earth,  and  at  intervals  changing  the 
location,  a  good  degree  of  decency  and  an  approach  to 
hygienic  conditions  were  preserved,  but  the  large  number 
of  men  confined,  in  my  time  about  7000,  and  the  constant 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  271 

use  of  various  parts  of  the  enclosure  for  this  purpose  for  a 
year,  undoubtedly  infiltrated  the  ground  with  an  amount 
of  poisonous  matter  dangerous  to  health.  These  conditions, 
which  prevailed  to  a  greater  or  less  degree  in  the  other 
Northern  prison  camps,  were  fully  recognized  by  the  authori- 
ties. The  records  show  that  these  prisons  were  frequently 
and  minutely  inspected  by  officers  under  orders  of  the 
Commissary  General  of  Prisons  at  Washington,  and  that 
everything  was  done  to  minimize  any  unsanitary  conditions. 
The  only  radical  cure,  removal  of  the  entire  prison  to  a  new 
location,  was  impossible,  but  the  enclosure  was  much 
enlarged  in  1864.  What  could  be  done  to  mitigate  trouble 
was  done.  The  hospital  accommodations,  which  from  the 
outset  had  been  fair,  were  extended,  ample  medical  supplies 
were  kept  on  hand,  the  barracks  were  kept  as  cleanly  as 
possible,  sufficient  clothing  was  supplied,  and  the  food, 
which  was  regularly  and  frequently  inspected,  was  of  good 
quality  and  ample  in  amount.  Under  standing  orders  from 
Washington  the  daily  ration  was  as  follows: 

Hard  bread  per  man  14  ounces 

or 

Soft  bread  "       "  16     " 

or 

Corn  meal  "       "  16  ounces 

Fresh  beef  "       "  14     " 

or 

Pork  or  bacon  "      "  10     " 

Beans  per  100  men  6  quarts 

or 

Rice  "     "      "  8  pounds 

Sugar  "     "     "  12     " 

Coffee,  ground  "     "     "  5     " 

or  raw  "     "     "  7     " 

or 

Tea  "     "     "  i  pound 

Soap  4  pounds 

Salt  e  quarts 

Vinegar  "     "      "  3     " 


272  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

Molasses  per  100  men  i  quart 

Potatoes  15  pounds 

During  the  summer  of  1864,  it  was  ordered  that  sugar,  coffee, 
and  tea  should  be  issued  only  to  the  sick  and  wounded,  the 
amounts  remaining  the  same.  The  unused  part  of  all 
rations  was  sold  and  from  it  was  formed  a  "prison  fund." 
This  was  applied  to  the  purchase  of  green  vegetables  and 
other  articles  conducive  to  the  health  of  the  prisoners,  and 
was  administered  with  scrupulous  fidelity. 

On  August  6,  1864,  C.  T.  Alexander,  Surgeon,  U.  S.  A., 
reported  to  the  Commissary-General  of  Prisons  that  the 
"prison  fund"  at  Camp  Morton  was  $36,215.52;  that  it  was 
well  managed;  that  the  individual  accounts  of  prisoners 
were  satisfactory  to  them;  that  the  prisoners  fully  under- 
stood their  privileges  and  traded  with  the  sutler  by  cheques. 

The  ration  above  described  is  identical  with  that  then  pre- 
scribed by  law  for  the  United  States  soldier.  It  was  ample 
in  amount  and  sufficiently  varied  in  character  to  keep  men 
in  sound  physical  condition,  but  also,  on  account  of  the  un- 
usually large  saving,  due  to  the  fact  that  these  men  consumed 
much  less  than  men  in  active  service,  it  permitted  the 
purchase  through  the  "prison  fund"  of  many  varieties  of 
food  and  delicacies  particularly  useful  and  welcome  to  the 
sick  and  wounded. 

At  the  time  of  which  I  write  the  cooking  at  Camp  Morton 
was  done  by  my  details.  We  baked  daily  from  5000  to  7000 
loaves,  about  six  inches  cube,  of  good  white  bread,  which 
gave  to  each  prisoner  a  loaf,  appetizing  and  healthful.  Our 
own  men  were  then  drawing  only  hard  tack  as  an  equiva- 
lent. On  their  arrival  the  prisoners  were  given  necessary 
clothing  and  blankets.  Each  man  received  one  of  the  latter, 
and  as  two  usually  bunked  together,  they  joined  forces. 
As  the  cold  weather  of  the  autumn  approached  we  made 
a  further  issue  of  a  blanket  apiece,  and  some  of  the  men 
fashioned  the  old  ones  into  capes  or  cloaks,  and  the  sight  of 
a  sturdy  Confederate  strolling  about  with  Uncle  Sam's 
U.  S.  branded  between  his  shoulders  was  not  uncommon. 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  273 

As  before  stated,  the  distressing  but  unavoidable  feature  of 
all  such  prisons,  idleness,  with  its  accompanying  nostalgia 
and  depression,  was  present  of  course.  To  relieve  this  in 
some  degree  the  prisoners  practised  many  small  trades,  of 
which  I  recall  especially  jewelry  making  and  carving.  Bone 
and  rubber  or  gutta-percha  coat  buttons  and  small  silver 
coins,  dimes,  and  quarters,  were  supplied  by  our  men,  and 
from  these  were  made  rings,  shirt  studs,  collar  buttons, 
sleeve  links,  and  Masonic  and  Odd  Fellows  insignia,  very 
neatly  finished,  with  the  designs  set  in  silver.  These 
trinkets  found  a  ready  market  among  our  men,  or  were  sold 
by  them  hi  town  and  the  proceeds  faithfully  turned  over  to 
the  manufacturer. 

One  distressing  feature  of  all  the  Southern  prisons  was 
happily  lacking  here.  The  area  enclosed  afforded  room  for 
the  inhabitants.  This  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  at  night 
when  the  men  were  in  barracks  the  grounds  were  empty,  and 
in  the  day  time  the  men  could  stroll  about  with  ample  room 
for  air,  exercise,  and  health.  The  terrible  contrast  to  this 
afforded  by  Southern  prison  conditions  will  appear  when  we 
reach  the  reverse  of  the  picture. 

As  official  corroboration  of  the  foregoing  account  given 
from  memory  of  the  conditions  at  Camp  Morton,  I  quote 
briefly  from  the  following  documents. 

On  March  23,  1863,  Capt.  H.  W.  Freedley,  3d  Regt., 
U.  S.  Infantry,  reported  to  Colonel  Wm.  Hoffman,  Com- 
missary-General of  Prisons,  Washington,  as  follows: 

"Camp  Morton  contains  accommodations  for  a  large  number 
of  prisoners.  They  are  well  provided  with  quarters  and  fuel 
and  have  ample  space  for  exercise.  All  are  well  provided  for; 
every  care  has  been  taken  of  the  wounded  and  all  appear  as 
cheerful  and  happy  as  could  be  expected  of  men  in  their  cir- 
cumstances. The  policing  of  the  camp  is  good  and  space  allotted 
to  prisoners  for  exercise  kept  neat  and  clean.  The  barracks 
are  in  good  order,  floors  cleanly  scoured  and  swept,  bedding  well 
aired  and  clean.  They  indulge  in  games  of  amusement  and 
exhibit  life  and  activity.  The  ration  was  found  to  be  good  and 
wholesome  in  all  its  parts." 


274  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

On  August  28,  1864,  Lieutenant  J.  W.  Davidson,  Veteran 
Reserve  Corps,  Inspector  of  Camps,  reported  through 
Colonel  Stevens  to  Captain  Harz,  Asst.  Adjutant-General, 
Washington: 

"The  kitchens  are  in  good  condition  and  kept  clean.  The 
grounds  undergo  a  thorough  policing  each  day.  Drainage  as 
perfect  as  locality  will  permit.  The  prisoners  will  require  the 
following  to  make  them  comfortable  for  winter,  viz. :  530  woollen 
blankets,  835  pair  trousers,  1250  pair  shoes,  850  shirts,  350  coats. 
Rations  furnished  daily  in  compliance  with  circular  order, 
(already  quoted).  Rations  of  soap  large,  but  not  more  than 
required. " 

The  records  show  that  these  supplies  were  furnished  within 
two  months. 

On  September  4,  1864,  the  same  officer  reports: 

"  Sanitary  condition  good.  Rations  issued  as  per  circular,  and 
antiscorbutics,  potatoes,  and  onions  three  times  a  week. " 

Further  reporting,  October  i6th,  he  says: 

"General  health  of  prisoners  greatly  benefited  by  thorough 
policing  and  exercising.  Clothing  and  bedding  have  been  issued 
to  all  destitute  men.  Potatoes  issued  every  day  at  rate  of  eight 
ounces  per  man. " 

I  close  with  his  report  of  November  6th,  when  my  regi- 
ment was  ordered  away: 

"Conduct:  prisoners  quiet;  no  attempts  to  escape.  Clean- 
liness, clothing,  bedding  all  good.  Quarters  good,  thoroughly 
policed  daily.  Kitchen  good.  Food  first-class.  Quantity 
sufficient.  Water  sufficient  and  good.  Sinks  sufficient  and 
kept  thoroughly  clean.  Drainage  complete.  Police  of  hospital 
thorough.  Attendance  of  sick  good.  Hospital  diet  first-class. 
General  health  of  prisoners  good." 

Let  us  glance  briefly  at  other  Northern  prisons.    The 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  275 

report  of  Surgeon  A.  M.  Clark,  Medical  Inspector  of  Prisoners 
of  War,  dated  April  8,  1864,  and  applying  to  the  prison  at 
Rock  Island,  111.,  gives  a  fair  idea  of  conditions  existing 
at  all  the  Northern  prisons  named  below.  From  this  I 
abstract  as  follows: 

"Barracks  well  warmed  by  stoves.  Cooking  done  by  detail. 
Kitchens  and  utensils  generally  clean  and  in  good  order.  Rations 
sufficient  in  quantity  and  of  good  quality.  All  prisoners  (6950) 
well  supplied  with  blankets,  and  in  general  well  clothed.  Polic- 
ing of  barracks  and  grounds  not  satisfactory,  must  be  im- 
proved. Drainage  ordered  but  not  completed.  Sinks  well 
arranged.  Laundry.  Caldrons  provided  but  not  enough  used  by 
prisoners.  Hospital — 560  beds — 17  surgeons." 

Lieutenant-Colonel  S.  Eastman,  U.  S.  A.,  command- 
ing depot,  reports  as  follows  regarding  the  Elmira  (N.  Y.) 
prison  May  23,  1864: 

"The  barracks  will  comfortably  accommodate  4000  prisoners 
without  crowding;  buildings  in  excellent  condition,  well  ventila- 
ted; Mess  room  will  seat  1200  to  1500.  Kitchen  can  cook  daily 
for  5000;  excellent  bakery;  daily  capacity  6000  rations." 

Colonel  B.  J.  Sweet,  8th  Reg.  Veteran  Reserve  Corps, 
commanding  post,  reports  as  follows  regarding  Camp 
Douglas,  rebel  prison  near  Chicago,  on  June  I,  1864: 

"The  grounds  of  Camp  Douglas  are  thoroughly  policed  and 
drained.  Barracks  arranged  on  streets  fifty  feet  wide,  twenty-five 
feet  between  ends;  whitewashed  inside  and  out  and  raised  four 
feet  above  ground.  The  present/thirty-two  barracks,  each  ninety 
feet  long,  will  hold  comfortably  165  men  each.  Recommends 
thirty-nine  more  barracks  giving  capacity  for  12,000  prisoners  at  a 
cost  of  $19,000." 

Certainly  our  Government  dealt  with  its  prisoners  with 

conscientious  regard  for  life,  and  in  no  niggardly  spirit. 

In  lighter  vein  let  these  extracts  made  by  D.  B.  Tiffany, 

U.  S.  Prison  Provost  Marshall,  from  the  letters  of  rebel 


2/6  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

prisoners  at  Camp  Chase,  Ohio,  to  their  friends  in  the  South 
speak  for  themselves : 

"I  want  nothing;  I  have  everything  that  heart  could 
wish  except  my  freedom.  I  am  doing  well  and  living  fine 
and  fat." — Jonathan  Musgrave  (Virginia). 

"We  get  plenty  to  eat  and  are  treated  very  well  by  the 
officers."— W.  A.  Womack  (Kentucky). 

"  Bill  of  fare  at  the  Virginia  House,  Christmas  day:  Bean 
soup,  hog  and  corn,  pork  and  hominy,  roast  beef,  turkey, 
duck,  chicken,  oysters,  apple  dumplings,  cakes,  peach  pie," — 
M.  E.  Russell  and  Ed.  (Virginia). 

"  We  have  nothing  to  do  but  eat  and  sleep.  We  have 
plenty  to  eat  and  to  drink,  and  a  very  good  bed.  We  have  no 
reason  to  complain." — John  A.  Carson  (Virginia). 

' '  We  are  doing  very  well.  The  officers  are  very  pleasant, 
and  agreeable  men  about  the  prison." — F.  P.  M.  Estis 
(Missouri). 

"I  received  a  letter  from  you  dated  the  i8th  of  this 
month.  You  express  a  great  deal  of  uneasiness  about  my 
sufferings  here.  I  have  a  good  husk  mattress,  a  parcel  of 
cotton  comforts,  and  two  pillows,  so  I  can  sleep  quite  com- 
fortably. The  good  Being  has  blest  me  in  my  afflictions." 
— D.  D.  Davidson  (Virginia). 

From  Post  Hospital,  Cape  Girardeau  (Missouri)  comes 
this:  "Col.  J.  O.  Shelby,  C.  S.  A.,  Commanding  Mo.  Cavalry 
Division.  Colonel,  We,  the  wounded  officers  of  your  brigade, 
take  pleasure  in  testifying  that  our  treatment  by  the  Fed- 
eral authorities  here  has  been  kind,  gentlemanly,  generous, 
and  disinterested.  All  our  wants  have  been  supplied,  and 
our  wishes  gratified,  and  General  McNeil  and  officers  have 
shown  by  constant  and  repeated  kindnesses  that  they  have 
no  enmity  beyond  the  hot  blood  and  the  excitement  of  the 
battlefield,  and  that  Confederate  prisoners  deserve  and  do 
receive  every  attention  which  courtesy  requires.  Three 
of  us  at  present  are  unable  to  be  moved." — Y.  H.  Blackwell 
(Major),  H.  M.  Woodsmall  (Capt.),  W.  H.  Ferrill  (Lieut.), 
J.  N.  Edwards  (Adjt.) 

In  this  connection  I  wish  to  call  attention  to  the  fact  that 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  277 

the  above  official  reports,  with  one  exception,  which  is 
necessary  to  complete  the  sequence,  relate  to  and  treat  of  the 
conditions  existing  during  the  spring,  summer,  and  autumn  of 
1864.  This  period  is  selected  for  several  reasons.  It  was 
the  year  during  which  the  greatest  accumulation  of  pris- 
oners occurred  on  both  sides,  and  it  was  the  year  when  the 
greatest  mortality  occurred  in  the  Southern  prisons,  and 
when  the  inhumanity  and  barbarity  of  the  treatment  of  our 
men  by  the  rebel  authorities  reached  its  maximum.  The 
comparison  therefore,  which  is  made  bet  ween  conditions  in  the 
two  sections,  evidenced  by  the  above  reports  and  by  those 
from  Confederate  sources  given  later  on,  must  be  recognized 
by  every  one  as  eminently  fair.  No  attempt  has  been  made 
to  select  a  period  of  the  best  Northern  conditions  and  con- 
trast it  with  the  worst  Southern  period.  In  1864  the  war 
had  been  in  progress  for  three  years.  Sectional  animosity 
was  at  its  height.  No  truce  or  settlement  was  contemplated 
by  any  one  other  than  might  come  from  the  exhaustion  of 
one  belligerent  or  the  other,  and  the  consequent  abandon- 
ment of  the  conflict.  All  the  embittering  elements  that 
entered  into  and  exasperated  the  feelings  upon  either  side  to 
the  highest  pitch  had  done  their  work.  The  forts  and  arsen- 
als of  the  Government  had  been  seized  by  the  rebels,  and 
hundreds  of  army  officers  had  foresworn  their  allegiance  to 
the  United  States  and  had  joined  the  Rebellion.  The  slaves 
had  been  freed  and  armed  as  soldiers.  Their  death,  and  that 
of  their  officers  in  case  of  capture,  had  been  proclaimed,  and 
was  being  generally  practised.  Exchanges  upon  equal 
terms  had  been  refused  and  had  ceased.  The  sufferings  of 
Union  soldiers  in  Southern  prisons  and  the  frightful  mor- 
tality there  were  known  at  the  North  and  testified  to  abun- 
dantly by  the  appearance  and  the  words  of  those  who 
returned  alive.  The  time  selected  is,  therefore,  in  all  respects 
the  fittest  for  comparison.  The  people  of  either  side  felt  the 
wrongs  they  believed  inflicted  upon  them  with  an  intensity 
far  greater  than  existed  earlier  in  the  war,  before  the  loss 
of  kindred,  friends,  and  property  had  been  felt  at  every 
fireside,  North  and  South,  and  had  converted  the  impulses 


278  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

of  loyalty  to  country,  state,  or  party  into  that  concen- 
trated, deadly  purpose  which  accompanies  a  struggle  for 
the  "survival  of  the  fittest. "  If,  under  these  circumstances, 
we  find  one  combatant  increasing  and  elaborating  its  care 
for  the  prisoners'  wants,  and  its  tenderness  for  the  sick  and 
wounded,  and  find  the  other,  confessedly  and  "with  malice 
aforethought,"  maintaining  and  intensifying  conditions  of 
suffering,  exposure  and  starvation,  which  it  was  in  its  power 
to  remedy,  or  at  least  to  alleviate;  intensifying  them  until 
brutality  merged  into  inhumanity  and  neglect  became  crime ; 
if,  I  say,  we  find  this  to  have  been  the  case,  we  have  a  fair 
measure  of  the  spirit  that  actuated  each  of  the  contending 
parties.  To  draw  that  comparison  without  extenuation 
and  also  without  malice,  to  present  the  true  picture  without 
deepening  the  shadows  or  heightening  the  sunlight,  is  the 
object  sought  by  me  in  quoting  the  official  reports  just  given 
and  those  from  Confederate  sources  which  will  follow.1 

In  concluding  these  sketches  of  prison  camps  in  the 
Union  States  I  wish  to  make  clear  one  salient  point.  From 
it  arose  the  chief,  though  not  the  only,  cause  of  the  appalling 
difference  between  the  treatment  of  prisoners  in  the  North 
and  of  those  in  the  South.  Our  men  did  not  regard  their 
prisoners  as  enemies.  No  inherited  or  imbibed  enmity,  no 
deep-seated  grudge,  no  hatred  because  of  the  locality  from 
which  they  came,  nor  any  trace  of  it,  existed  in  their  minds  or 
hearts  toward  their  rebel  prisoners.  The  ideas  and  concep- 
tions of  our  army  deliberately  and  persistently  taught  to  the 
Southern  soldiers  by  the  rebel  leaders  and  press,  which  found 
expression  in  the  thousands  of  printed  records  of  the  war, 
the  scornful  contempt  as  toward  an  inferior  race,  the  imputa- 
tion of  innate  inhumanity  and  love  of  cruelty,  joined  with 
cowardice,  formed  no  part  of  the  creed  of  our  men.  The 
latter  felt  that  their  antagonists  were  brave  men  who  had 
fought  fairly  and  gallantly  and  were  prisoners  by  the  fortune 
of  war.  Abusive  language  or  abusive  treatment  of  them  did 
not  enter  into  the  code  of  the  Union  soldier.  In  their 
rough  way  they  were  sorry  for  the  prisoner  and  wanted  his 

1  On  this  important  subject,  see  note,  page  326. 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  279 

needs  supplied,  from  clothing  to  tobacco,  and  were  ready  to 
contribute  from  their  own  stores.  How  this  compares  with 
the  feeling  that  met  them  when  the  situation  was  reversed, 
our  story  will  tell.  It  is  worth  noting  here  that  our  Govern- 
ment did  not  swerve  from  its  humane  policy  for  purposes  of 
general  retaliation.  Special  instances  there  were  when  the 
acts  of  the  rebel  authorities,  such  as  the  killing  of  the  white 
officers  of  colored  regiments  in  cold  blood  after  surrender, 
the  confining  of  them  in  dark  and  wet  dungeons  below  ground, 
heavily  manacled,  and  on  a  scanty  diet  of  raw  meal  and 
water,  and  the  placing  of  them  in  shackles  under  the  fire  of 
guns,  necessitated  similar  action  by  us  to  compel  redress  and 
save  the  lives  of  our  men,  but  these  were  exceptional.  When 
the  statements  of  our  released  soldiers,  corroborated  by  their 
emaciated  and  pitiful  condition,  convinced  our  officers 
charged  with  the  exchanges,  that  great  cruelty  was  being 
practised  by  the  Confederate  authorities,  Mr.  Lincoln  was 
repeatedly  urged  by  officials  and  officers  of  high  rank  to 
treat  all  rebel  prisoners  as  our  men  were  being  treated.  But 
this  he  steadily  declined  to  do,  saying  that  he  would  observe 
the  usages  of  civilized  warfare  whatever  our  antagonists 
might  do. 

And  this  was  also  the  attitude  of  Congress.  Those  prison- 
ers who,  after  exchange,  appeared  before  the  United  States 
Senate  Committee  on  Prisoners  of  War,  were  asked  what  was 
best  to  be  done  to  secure  good  treatment  for  our  captive 
soldiers  in  the  South.  The  ready  answer  was,  "Retaliation 
in  kind."  But  the  chairman,  bluff  Senator  Ben  Wade, 
truly  said  that  no  government  could  stand  the  odium  of  such 
an  act ;  that  it  would  become  accursed  of  God  and  man  and 
would  perish  from  the  earth. 

The  facts  I  have  given  are  intended  to  establish  the 
humane  purpose  and  acts  of  our  Government  toward  its 
prisoners,  but  I  do  not  wish  to  convey  the  idea  that  the 
utmost  effort  can  do  more  than  minimize  the  sad  condition 
of  all  prisoners  of  war.  The  hardships  that  have  preceded, 
and  the  wounds  and  sickness  often  existing  at  the  time  of 
capture,  form  predisposing  causes  to  which  must  be  added 


28O  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

nostalgia,  or  homesickness,  constantly  mentioned  in  our 
surgeons'  reports  as  an  active  evil.  When  you  add  to  this 
the  lack  of  regularly  enforced  exercise,  and  the  ignorance  or 
recklessness  as  to  personal  cleanliness  and  hygiene  of  the 
average  rebel  prisoners,  you  have  bad  conditions  to  face. 
In  confirmation  of  my  analysis  of  the  attitude  of  the 
Union  soldier  toward  his  antagonists,  I  give  one  illustration 
(space  will  not  permit  more)  taken,  like  most  of  my  quota- 
tions, from  Confederate  records.  Writing  from  Lee  Hospi- 
tal, Columbus,  Ga.,  May  10,  1864,  Surgeon-in-Charge  Wm. 
A.  Robertson,  C.  S.  A.,  addresses  Hon.  J.  P.  Benjamin, 
Secretary  of  State,  C.  S.  A. : 

"I  notice  among  the  captives  General  T.  Seymour,  U.  S.  A., 
and  think  it  my  duty  to  inform  the  Government  of  his  conduct 
toward  the  wounded,  taken  prisoners  at  the  battle  of  Sharpsburg 
(Antietam),  September,  1862.  I  was  brigade  surgeon  and  was 
left  in  charge  of  1 17  wounded.  We  were  very  destitute,  but  were 
visited  on  the  next  day  by  General  Seymour.  He  immediately 
ordered  the  chief  surgeon  of  his  division  to  turn  over  to  me  any 
and  all  articles  in  his  possession  that  I  might  need  for  our  wounded. 
During  our  stay  he  visited  the  hospital  daily ,  and  whenever 
any  men  were  pointed  out  by  me  as  needing  a  change,  he  visited 
General  McClellan  in  person  and  procured  paroles  for  them  to 
visit  Baltimore  until  exchanged.  He  supplied  those  dangerously 
wounded  with  delicacies  from  his  own  table  and  a  sufficiency  of 
tobacco  for  all,  thereby  mitigating  the  sufferings  of  our  wounded 
and  exhibiting  a  most  commendable  spirit.  I  refer  for  further 
evidence  to  Captain  Harper,  Lieutenant  Knox,  and  Surgeon 
Davis,  yth  Louisiana,  to  Surgeon  Aiken,  I5th  Alabama,  and 
Brigade  Surgeon  Howard." 

It  is  a  sad  commentary  on  this  that  on  June  I,  1864,  less 
than  one  month  later  we  find  an  official  recommendation 
made  by  Ribly,  Assistant  Adjutant-General,  C.  S.  A.,  to 
the  Secretary  of  War,  "that  General  Seymour  (on  account 
of  his  rank)  and  fifty  others  be  confined  under  the  enemy's 
fire  in  the  city  of  Charleston. "  Of  his  own  prison  experi- 
ence General  Seymour  writes,  August  10,  1864,  to  Colonel 
Hoffman,  U.  S.  A.,  Commissary  of  Prisoners: 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  28l 

"To  us  who  have  personally  experienced  the  attentions  of 
Southern  jailers,  the  subject  is  one  of  bitter  remembrance.  For 
our  rebel  prisoners  we  construct  elegant  accommodations  and 
admit  luxuries,  while  our  people  rot  with  dirt  and  scurvy.  At 
Andersonville,  the  scene  would  disgrace  a  race  of  cannibal 
barbarians.  Scores  die  daily  from  sheer  neglect  and  with  less 
care  than  a  rotten  sheep  would  receive  from  a  brutal  owner.  .  .  . 
I  have  written  fully  for  the  benefit  of  the  thousands  who  will 
starve  and  die  in  Southern  bondage.  Had  you,  like  us,  been 
locked  in  felon  cells,  and  been  treated,  like  us,  as  outlaws  and 
felons,  or  worse,  there  would  be  no  need  to  pray  you  to  show 
them  (rebel  prisoners)  [the  same  treatment,  and  this  in  pure 
mercy  toward  those  (our  men)  still  in  their  hands. " 

As  it  has  been  often  and  falsely  stated  that  the  deaths  in 
our  prisons  closely  approximated  those  of  Belle  Isle,  Ander- 
sonville, and  Salisbury,  I  give  here  an  extract  from  the  report 
of  Charles  J.  Kipp,  Surgeon-in-Charge,  dated  Camp  Morton, 
July  30,  1864.  He  reports  that  in  the  preceding  twelve 
months  558  deaths  had  occurred  from  all  causes  and  adds: 

"  Most  of  the  diseases  show  malarial  poisoning,  and  are  com- 
plicated with  nostalgia,  scurvy,  bronchitis,  pneumonia,  and  dys- 
entery. The  malarial  character  of  Central  Indiana  then  and 
now  is  well  known,  our  regimental  sick  list  was  large,  and  for 
the  reason  above  given  the  prisoners  undoubtedly  felt  its  effects 
in  a  greater  degree." 

Similarly  on  June  12,  1864,  Major  E.  A.  Scoville  I28th 
Ohio,  Superintendent  of  the  Prisons,  Johnson's  Island,  Ohio: 

"  The  sanitary  condition  of  prisoners  is  good.  Whole  number 
of  prisoners  2145;  number  in  hospital  34;  deaths  last  week  none." 

When,  however,  we  compare  these  records,  covering  an 
average  prison  population  of  6000  to  7000  men  in  a  prison, — 
perhaps  the  most  sickly  one  in  the  North  by  reason  of  its 
location  in  a  miasmatic  region  with  rich  alluvial  soil, — re- 
grettable as  they  are,  with  the  wagon  loads  of  dead  approxi- 
mating one  hundred  corpses  a  day  (by  Confederate  official 
reports)  hauled  out  of  the  Andersonville  stockade  at  this 


282  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

same  period  (15,000  during  1864  alone),  words  are  not  needed 
to  emphasize  the  mendacity  and  the  absurdity  of  any  attempt 
by  Southern  or  sympathetic  Northern  writers  to  claim  or 
establish  a  similarity  of  treatment  or  any  approximation  of 
numerical  equality  in  the  death  record. 

Nor  were  these  striking  contrasts  and  wide  dissimilarity 
in  death-rates  confined  to  the  stockade  or  open  air-camps. 
One  citation  is  sufficient,  and  it  is  taken  from  the  Richmond 
prisons,  a  locality  where,  it  being  the  seat  of  the  Confederate 
Government,  the  best  medical  ability  and  the  largest  amount 
and  variety  of  medical  supplies  were  concentrated.  T'On 
April  I,  1864,  Surgeon  G.  Wm.  Semple,  C.  S.  A.,  rendered  to 
the  Surgeon-General,  C.  S.  A.,  his  "quarterly  report  of 
General  Hospital  No.  21 — for  Federal  prisoners  at  Richmond 
Va."  Restates: 

"Total  cases  for  three  months,  2779;  total  deaths  same 
period,  1396,  fifty  per  cent."     It  follows  that  the  death-rate 
was  two  hundred  per  cent,  per  annum  of  the  number  of 
men  that  the  hospital  could  contain  at  any  one   time:} 
Further  comment  is  unnecessary. 

In  his  Reminiscences  of  the  Civil  War,  Gen.  John  B. 
Gordon,  of  the  Confederate  service,  describes  his  plan  for 
an  attack  on  Grant's  lines  in  front  of  Petersburg  during 
March,  1865.  This  plan,  which  was  approved  by  Lee, 
contemplated  the  capture  of  Fort  Stedman  in  our  main  line, 
the  turning  of  our  flank,  a  rush  to  City  Point,  only  ten  miles 
distant,  and  the  capture  of  the  vast  quantity  of  supplies 
there,  on  land  and  on  the  transports,  and  as  a  sequence,  the 
creation  of  such  confusion  among  our  troops  as  would 
enable  Lee  safely  to  evacuate  Petersburg.  While  this  plan 
was  being  matured  by  our  antagonists,  an  incident  occurred 
on  our  side  to  which  was  due  in  large  measure  the  temporary 
success  of  their  attack  when  it  was  made  later  on.  Deser- 
tions from  the  rebel  army  were  very  numerous  at  this  time, 
and  at  least  fifty  men  came  in  to  our  lines  nightly,  along  the 
front  of  our  division.  This  steady  depletion  of  their  fighting 
strength  was  valuable  to  us,  and  General  Grant  conceived 
the  idea  of  increasing  it  and  at  the  same  time  diminish- 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  283 

ing  their  supply  of  guns  by  offering  additional  inducements. 
He,  therefore,  had  printed  a  large  number  of  leaflets  in  which 
the  rebel  soldiers  were  told  that  if  when  deserting  to  our  lines, 
they  brought  in  their  guns,  they  would  be  paid  a  fair  value 
for  them  and  upon  reaching  City  Point  would  be  transported 
without  charge  to  New  York,  or  any  seaboard  city  in  the 
North.  Accompanying  these  leaflets  were  orders  to  distri- 
bute them  among  our  pickets  with  instructions  to  get  the 
papers  into  the  hands  of  the  rebel  pickets  by  any  convenient 
means.  These  orders  came  to  us  under  the  written  author- 
ity of  Colonel  T.  S.  Bowers,  Assistant  Adjutant-General  on 
General  Grant's  staff  at  City  Point.  I  well  remember  the 
substance  of  the  comment  made  by  General  McLaughlen, 
upon  whose  staff  I  was  serving  as  aide-de-camp,  when  he  re- 
ceived these  unusual  orders.  He  was  an  officer  of  the  old 
school  and  a  thorough  soldier.  He  had  been  with  Kearny 
and  the  Second  Dragoons  in  Mexico,  in  1848,  and  his  lan- 
guage was  not  always  tempered  for  a  drawing-room.  Turning 
to  me  he  said: " Lieutenant,  by  God,  sir,  that  is  the  first  time 
in  my  life,  from  sergeant-major  to  brigadier,  that  I  was  ever 
ordered  to  let  an  enemy  approach  my  post  with  a  gun  in  his 
hand!"  Those  leaflets,  no  doubt,  suggested  to  Gordon  a 
justifiable  ruse,  and  when,  later  on,  he  made  his  attack,  his 
men  approached  our  pickets  calling  out,  "Don't  shoot,  we  're 
coming  in!"  It  was  the  dark  hour  before  dawn,  and  they 
took  our  picket  line  practically  without  firing  a  shot.  The 
distance  between  the  lines  was  very  short,  not  over  a  hundred 
yards,  and  in  the  daytime  not  a  head  could  be  shown  on 
either  side  without  bringing  a  shot. 

This  is  well  illustrated  by  another  extract  from  Gordon's 
Memoirs,  which  richly  deserves  quotation  also  as  showing 
the  truth  of  what  I  have  asserted  regarding  our  men. 
Gordon  says  that  he  had  standing  by  him  on  top  of  their 
works  a  single  soldier  with  his  musket,  who  was  to  fire  the 
attacking  signal. 

"  My  men  in  cutting  away  our  own  cheveaux  defrise  to  allow 
the  column  passage  were  heard  by  a  Union  picket,  who  was  on 


284  PRISONERS  OF  WAR  . 

guard  a  few  rods  from  me.  '  What  are  you  doing,  Johnny? 
Answer  quick  or  I  '11  shoot,'  came  the  challenge.  '  Never  mind, 
Yank,'  was  the  answer,  '  lie  down  and  go  to  sleep;  we  are  just 
gathering  a  little  corn' — [there  were  some  stalks  between  the  lines] ; 
'you  know  rations  are  mighty  short  here.'  To  which  the  Union 
picket  promptly  replied:  'All  right,  Johnny,  go  ahead  and  get  your 
corn,  I  '11  not  shoot  at  you  while  you  're  drawing  your  rations.'  " 

Let  me  give  the  end  of  the  little  story;  again  I  quote  the 
rebel  general: 

"I  ordered  the  private  to  fire  the  signal.  He  hesitated. 
His  conscience  seemed  to  get  hold  of  him.  He  was  going  into 
a  fearful  charge  with  the  lie  on  his  lips  which  had  thrown  the 
Union  picket  off  his  guard.  He  felt  it  was  not  fair  to  take  ad- 
vantage of  the  soldierly  sympathy  of  his  foe,  and  when  I  again 
ordered:  'Fire  your  gun,  sir,'  he  shouted,  'Hello,  Yank!  Wake 
up,  we  are  going  to  shell !  Look  out,  we  are  coming!'  and  with 
that  fired  the  shot  that  launched  the  attack. " 

Here,  Companions,  is  that  "touch  of  Nature  which  makes 
the  whole  world  kin."  We  ought  not  to  miss  such  incidents, 
for  they  stand  out  against  the  dark  background  of  war's 
brutality  as  stars  peep  through  the  breaks  in  the  black 
clouds  of  a  stormy  night. 

In  an  article  entitled  Glimpses  of  the  Confederate  Army, 
by  Randolph  H.  McKim,  published  in  the  April  number  of 
Review  of  Reviews,  the  writer  narrates  the  following  incident 
referring  to  General  Gordon's  attack  above  described: 

"When  the  order  to  advance  was  given,  a  big  Texan  stepped 
out  and  said:  'General  Gordon,  this  column  can't  move  before 
i  A.M.  The  men  have  a  truce  with  the  Yanks,  and  it  ain  't  up 
till  one  o'clock.'  The  column  did  not  move  till  that  hour. 
The  private  in  the  ranks  had  taken  command. " 

This  is  in  keeping  with  the  somewhat  sentimental  charac- 
ter of  the  article  and  its  idealized  Southern  soldier,  but  it  is 
not  history,  though  much  history  is  made  in  this  way.  It  is 
apochryphal.  On  page  401,  of  Gordon's  Memoirs,  he  quotes 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  285 

his  statement  to  Lee  three  days  before  the  attack,  naming, 
4  A.M.  as  the  hour.  On  page  407,  he  quotes  Lee's  letter  of 
the  24th,  which  said,  "  The  cavalry  is  ordered  to  report  to  you 
at  3  A.M.  to-morrow"  (the  25th),  and  on  the  same  page  he 
says,  "All  things  ready  at  4  A.M.  I  stood  on  the  top  of 
the  breastworks."  The  attack  from  its  inception  was 
intended  for  the  "hour  before  dawn,"  the  well-known 
favorite  time  with  officers  of  both  sides  for  attempting  a 
surprise,  and  it  was  made  as  intended. 

To  return  to  the  attack.  It  failed,  but  the  rebels  occu- 
pied temporarily  a  mile  of  our  line  extending  northward  from 
Fort  Haskell,  and  retreating,  swept  away  with  them  about 
1500  prisoners,  of  whom  I  was  one.  Having  carried  some 
orders  for  the  general,  I  was  returning  to  report,  and  had 
reached  the  entrenchments,  when  I  met  one  of  our  officers 
running  and  stumbling  to  the  rear,  with  a  white  face  and  fear 
written  all  over  him.  Without  stopping  he  shouted,  "All 's 
lost ! "  and  plunged  on.  (It  is  interesting  to  note  that  I  met 
him  two  months  later  in  Washington  in  the  glory  of  a  new 
double-breasted  uniform,  having  been  promoted  two  grades 
to  the  rank  of  major  for  "gallant  services  at  the  battle  of 
Fort  Stedman ! ")  I  went  on,  and  quickly  found  myself  with 
a  group  which,  in  the  darkness,  I  took  for  my  own  men,  and 
for  a  few  moments  I  gave  them  orders  about  repelling  the 
next  attack  from  without.  They  moved  about  rather 
sullenly,  and  as  the  light  brightened  I  saw  a  man  climbing 
through  a  gun  embrasure,  who  wore  a  soft  felt  hat.  The 
conviction  that  they  were  rebels  flashed  through  me,  and 
telling  them  I  would  return,  I  turned  away,  and  got  out  of 
their  sight  among  the  bomb-proof  huts.  Still  trying  to 
reach  my  general,  however,  of  whose  earlier  capture  I  was 
ignorant,  I  walked  into  another  body  of  the  rebel  gentry, 
was  recognized  and,  with  a  musket  at  my  breast  to  ensure 
promptness,  and  the  assurance  from  the  holder  thereof  that 
he  would  rather  kill  me  than  not,  was  stripped  of  sabre  and 
overcoat.  I  was  then  sent  under  guard  the  short  distance  to 
Petersburg,  where,  in  a  warehouse,  I  found  my  companions 
in  misfortune.  Just  within  the  rebel  lines  I  passed  close  to 


286  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

General  Lee,  who  was  awaiting  the  result  of  Gordon's  attack. 
He  wore  on  his  head  a  broad-brimmed  gray  sombrero,  and 
over  his  shoulders  an  army  cape.  The  white  horse  he  rode 
was,  I  presume,  the  well-known  "Traveller."  In  Peters- 
burg we  were  stripped  of  our  small  personal  belongings,  such 
as  pocket-knives,  pocket  combs,  etc.,  and  were  then  marched 
several  miles  toward  Richmond  under  guard.  At  a  point 
beyond  the  reach  of  Union  shells  we  found  box-cars,  and  by 
5  P.M.,  we  were  unloaded  in  Richmond. 

<  Our  route  to  our  hotel,  the  famous,  or  infamous  Libby 
Prison,  lay  down  Main  Street,  and  I  was  impressed  by  the 
fact  that  every  man  we  saw  of  fighting  age  was  in  uniform. 
The  "crowd"  consisted  of  old  men,  boys,  and  women,  and 
it  was  evident  that  the  saying  that  the  Confederacy  had 
"robbed  the  cradle  and  the  grave"  for  soldiers,  lacked  little 
of  reality.  The  boys  welcomed  us  with  shouts  of  "Here 
come  the  Yanks!"  and  "Here  are  the  blue  bellies!"  but  no 
violence  was  offered. '  At  the  Libby,  a  brick  and  stone  prison,' 
we  were  received  by  Dick  Turner,  who,  with  his  brother 
Major  Thomas  P.  Turner,  and  Gen.  John  H.  Winder,  gained 
a  reputation  for  causeless  brutality  to  prisoners  during  the 
war  that  was  second  only  to  that  of  Wirz  of  Andersonvillei 
and  the  keepers  of  the  other  open-air,  or," stockade"  prisons, 
as  they  were  called,  at  Salisbury  and  elsewhere. 

[At  this  point  in  the  address  was  exhibited  on  the  wall 
the  original  garrison  flag,  the  "Stars  and  Bars "  which  floated 
over  Libby  Prison  when  we  entered  it,  and  which  was 
captured  by  Gen.  Edward  H.  Ripley  when  he  entered  at 
the  head  of  the  first  Union  troops  after  the  evacuation  of 
Richmond  by  the  rebels.] 

At  our  entrance  our  money  was  taken  away,  the  officers 
were  separated  from  the  enlisted  men,  and  we  were  installed 
for  permanent  detention  in  a  room  on  the  second  floor  of  the 
old  tobacco  warehouse, 'our  men  being  placed  in  other  parts 
of  the  building  A  No  blankets  or  food  were  given  us,  and 
each,  picking  out  the  softest  board  he  could  find,  lay  down 
for  the  night,  j 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  287 

-  The  room  we  occupied  was  a  rectangle  100  feet  by  45.- 
One  end  looked  upon  the  street,  and  one  upon  the  James 
River.  There  were  three  windows  openings  at  each  end, 
grated  with  iron  bars,  but  having  no  sashes  or  shutters,  and 
entirely  open  to  the  wind  and  cold.  At  one  end  was  a  rough 
toilet  sink  and  a  water  faucet  with  an  iron  basin.  The 
furniture  consisted  of  a  medium-sized  iron  stove  and  a  table 
of  rough  boards, — no  chairs,  stools,  or  benches. 

Life  here  quickly  assumed  a  monotonous  routine -in 
which,  of  course,  the  first  thought  in  my  mind  was  the  pre- 
servation of  health,  physical  and  mental.  I  realized  that  it 
was  going  to  be  a  question  of  endurance,  and  planned  accord- 
ingly. I  was  young  and  unusually  strong  and  vigorous,  and 
the  idea  that  death  was  imminent  did  not  impress  me.  I 
was  the  first  up  every  morning,  and  going  to  the  water  faucet 
I  would  strip  to  the  buff  and  wash  all  over  with -the  cold 
yellow  water,  using  my  single  handkerchief  very  cautiously 
to  dry  my  face.  I  would  then  hang  the  handkerchief  up 
to  dry,  and  dressing,  would  walk  the  floor  for  exercise. 
Under  such  circumstances  men  seek  a  chum,  and  I  found 
one  in  a  young  Swiss  officer  who  had  obtained  a  long  fur- 
lough from  home  and  enlisted  with  us  for  practical  experience. 
This  I  am  sure  he  got.  He  had  been  well  educated  at  a 
military  school  in  Europe,  and  I  determined  at  once  to  go 
to  school  to  him  and  pump  as  much  information  out  of 
him  as  possible.  His  readiest  asset  was  his  knowledge 
of  French,  and  hour  after  hour,  in  the  days  that  followed, 
we  paced  the  room,  he  talking  fluently  and  I  patching 
sentences  together  in  response.  Another  of  his  possessions 
was  a  knowledge  of  fencing.  Borrowing  a  knife  that  had 
escaped  confiscation,  we  split  some  long  strips  off  the  table 
with  infinite  labor,  and  equipped  with  these  rapiers  passed 
many  an  hour  in  tierce  and  carte. 

The  overpowering  anxiety,  however,  was  the  question 
of  food,  of  which  it  was  immediately  apparent  that  we  should 
not  get  enough  to  maintain  strength  or  possibly  life.  —It  was 
sent  to  us  twice  a  day,  viz.,  at  10  and  4,  and  consisted  of 
corn  bread,  baked  in  the  prison  ovens.  In  substance  it 


288  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

was  a  composite  of  the  inner  leaf  or  shuck  of  the  plant, 
together  with  the  cob  and  the  grain  coarsely  ground  together. 
The  exterior  was  generally  burned  black  through  careless- 
ness or  indifference.  This  came  to  us  in  round  cakes 
twelve  or  fourteen  inches  across,  and  about  three  inches 
thick  in  the  centre.~*These  cakes  were  measured  with  mathe- 
matical accuracy ,-*and  divided  by  our  house  committee 
into  as  many  pieces  as  there  were  mouths  to  feed.  -The 
proportion  to  each,  however,  was  painfully  small.-  I  brought 
away  with  me  the  last  half -day  ration.—  It  was  between 
three  and  four  inches  long,  two  inches  high,  and  one  inch 
thick.-  Rare  variations  occurred  by  way  of  substitution. 
On  one  occasion-  several  pails  of  so-called  bean  soup  were 
sent  ur>.  These  were  the  usual  horse  buckets  used  in  stables 
and  contained  a  black  water,  bitter,  without  nutrition  and 
undrinkable,  and  at  the  bottom  about  a  half  pint  of  beans.- - 
Hungry  as  we  were,  we  threw  away  the  water  and  carefully 
collected  the  beans,  dried  them  in  the  sun,  and  although 
they  were  -half  rawr  gladly  chewed  up  our  teaspoonful 
apiece.  Confirmation  of  my  recollection  of  this  appetizing  ( ?) 
dish  is  found  in  the  writings  of  Lieut.  Asa  B.  Isham,  7th 
Michigan  Cavalry,  who  was  also  in  the  Libby  and  says 
of  the  soup:  "It  was  made  up  of  brown  beans,  black  bugs, 
and  long  brown  worms  in  about  equal  proportions,  suspended 
in  a  liquor  having  the  color  and  flavor  of  tan- vat  water." 
Another  day  a  smoked  shoulder  of  ham  was  supplied,  but 
on  trying  to  lift  it  by  the  knuckle  the  whole  bone  pulled 
out  revealing  the  interior  a  mass  of  wriggling  maggots.  So 
we  turned  down  the  poisonous  mess  preferring  to  go  decently 
hungry  to  bed.  I  do  not  recall  any  material  deviation  or 
addition  furnished  us  by  our  rebel  hosts  from  their  supplies. 
We  did  not  see  either  fresh  or  smoked  meat,  or  any  vegetable, 
during  our  imprisonment.  The  diet  was  cob-meal  solely, 
ground  with  the  shuck  and  in  the  amounts  described.  In 
many  official  communications  sent  to  our  exchange  officers, 
in  many  official  reports  (now  accessible)  which  passed 
between  Confederate  authorities,  and  in  many  histories  and 
memoirs  written  from  a  Southern  standpoint  since  the  war, 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  289 

it  is  asserted  that  Union  prisoners  were  given  the  same  rations 
as  the  Confederate  troops.  No  troops  could  have  lived  and 
fought  on  what  we  received.  Nor  was  the  statement  true 
of  any  Southern  prison.  An  exhaustive  examination  of  the 
records  shows  conclusively  that  our  food  and  treatment  were 
as  good  as,  if  not  better  than,  any  other,  and  that  in  many 
prisons  the  conditions  were  infinitely  worse.  That  this  was  a 
regular  condition  is  shown  by  the  letter  of  General  Neal  Dow 
to  Secretary  Stanton,  dated  Richmond,  November  13,  1863, 
when  the  rebellion  was  yet  prosperous. 

One  or  two  rays  of  sunlight  reached  us  from  our  own 
people  later  on ;  we  did  not  know  whether  they  came  from  our 
own  Government  or  the  Sanitary  Commission.  We  each 
received  a  half  blanket,  and  a  small  amount  of  white  flour 
and  molasses,  about  one  meal  apiece,  was  given  to  us  in 
bulk.  The  flour  was  uncooked,  and  we  had  no  cooking  uten- 
sils, nor,  during  all  this  time,  any  fire.  But  on  this  festive 
occasion  we  begged  some  fuel,  lighted  the  stove,  mixed  the 
flour  with  James  River  water  from  the  pipe,  moulded  it 
into  dough  with  our  hands,  and  spread  it  as  thinly  as  possible 
on  the  lid  of  the  stove.  When  it  had  gained  all  that  heat 
would  accomplish  it  was  cut  into  strips,  and  each  man  got 
one.  They  were  not  unlike  bits  of  whitish  gutta-percha. 
We  dipped  these  sticks  into  the  molasses  and  then  labori- 
ously chewed  off  a  chunk  devoting  such  a  time  to  its  masti- 
cation as  would  have  made  the  most  ardent  disciple  of 
Fletcherism  green  with  envy.  Of  course  during  all  this  time 
belts  were  being  drawn  tighter  daily,  and  the  fearful  possibili- 
ties of  the  future,  the  "coming  events  that  cast  their  shadows 
before,"  were  having  their  effect  on  the  minds  of  the  men. 

We  had  been  there  but  a  short  time  when  other  prisoners 
were  brought  in.  They  usually  arrived  in  the  evening  and 
were  always  greeted  with  the  cry,  "Fresh  fish!  Fresh  fish!" 
which  was  a  prison  slogan  that  I  then  heard  for  the  first  time. 
These  additions  brought  the  number  in  this  room  to  ninety- 
three,  and  we  were  pretty  closely  packed  on  the  floor  at  night. 
The  new  men  were  indeed  objects  for  the  deepest  sympathy. 
They  came  from  other  Southern  prisons  and  had  been  in 


290  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

confinement  for  one  or  two  years.  Clothing  they  had 
none ;  what  hung  about  their  persons  was  a  mass  of  rags.  A 
gunny-sack,  a  piece  of  blanket  or  carpet,  or  a  fragment  of  a 
woollen  shirt  or  shelter  tent,  was  variously  worn  about  the 
body  or  tied  around  the  feet  if  the  latter  were  not  entirely 
bare.  They  were  emaciated,  and  tottered  as  they  walked. 
Most  of  them  had  chronic  dysentery,  scurvy,  or  malarial 
fever.  Their  hair  and  beards  had  not  been  combed  for 
months,  and  all  were  infested  with  vermin  to  a  degree  that 
was  strange  and  horrible  to  us.  Their  eyes  seemed  vacant, 
their  faces  hopeless.  They  talked  little  and  sat  against  the 
wall  or  lay  on  the  floor,  hardly  able  to  comprehend  or  to 
respond  to  a  friendly  greeting  or  a  word  of  cheer.  And  these 
men,  then  at  the  lowest  ebb  of  physical  and  mental  power, 
had  been  vigorous,  athletic,  intelligent  officers  when  the 
fortune  of  war  made  them  prisoners  of  the  South. 

Above  and  beyond  these  definable  ills  was  that  intense 
mental  depression,  born  of  present  suffering  and  apprehension 
for  the  future,  which  the  strongest  minded  does  not  escape, 
and  which  only  one  who  has  been  a  prisoner  can  under- 
stand. To  know  that  you  are  absolutely  at  the  mercy  of  an 
enemy  embittered  by  personal  resentment  (hatred  would 
not  be  too  strong  a  word)  and  made  desperate  by  the  know- 
ledge of  the  approaching  failure  of  the  cause  he  had  fought 
for;  to  know  that  iron  bars  guard  all  windows  and  doors, 
and  to  see  comrades  weakening  and  dying  day  by  day  in 
increasing  ratio,  forms  a  combination  which,  by  paralyzing 
the  mind,  destroys  the  body.  The  words  of  the  dear  old 
hackneyed  song,  Tramp,  tramp,  tramp,  the  boys  are  march- 
ing, have  a  very  vital  meaning  to  us.  We  have  known 
what  is  meant  by 

"  In  the  prison  cell  I  sit,  thinking,  mother  dear,  of  you, 
And  the  dear  and  happy  home  so  far  away, 
And  the  tears  they  fill  my  eyes,  spite  of  all  that  I  can  do, 
As  I  try  to  cheer  my  comrades  and  be  gay. 

"In  the  dreary  prison  cell,  we  are  waiting  for  the  day 
Which  shall  come  to  open  wide  the  prison  door, 


Photographed  from  the  original. 

Facsimile  of  the  cover  of  the  Libby  Prison  Order  Book 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  29 1 

And  the  careworn  eye  grows  bright  and  the  poor  heart  almost 

gay, 
As  we  think  of  seeing  home  and  friends  once  more!" 

That  the  mind  may  realize  what  the  eye  hath  not  seen,  I 
quote  again  from  Lieutenant  Isham,  who  was  exchanged  at 
Charleston,  S.  C.,  in  December,  1864. 

"Six  hundred  men  who  had  been  at  Andersonville  were 
exchanged  with  us.  Many  were  entirely  destitute  of  clothing 
and  shivering  in  the  piercing  wind  from  the  sea,  and  such  rags 
as  were  possessed  by  others  were  covered  with  masses  of  lice. 
A  large  number  were  mere  skeletons.  In  many  instances  the  bones 
of  hips,  spine,  and  shoulders  projected  bare  through  the  skin. 
Not  less  than  a  dozen  gaping  and  grinning  idiots  were  among 
them  with  vacant  eyes,  sunk  deep  in  their  bony  sockets.  The 
skin  was  like  black  parchment  from  the  ravages  of  scurvy,  and 
bleeding,  spongy  bones,  from  which  the  flesh  had  rotted  away 
appeared  at  the  feet.  Over  one-half  of  these  men  died  on  the 
way,  and  probably  less  than  one  hundred  ever  regained  health. 
Of  these  men  a  Confederate  officer,  who  had  been  a  prisoner,  said 
to  Major  George  B.  Cox  of  the  75th  Ohio,  'If  I  had  been  the 
Confederate  Exchange  Commissioner  my  regard  for  the  reputation 
of  the  people  of  the  South  would  never  have  permitted  me  to 
turn  over  such  physical  wrecks  as  your  men  are  to  proclaim  to  the 
world  the  infamous  barbarity  of  the  Confederate  Government.' " 

Of  Belle  Island,  Colonel  W.  Hoffman  3d  U.  S.  Infantry, 
and  Commissary- General  of  Prisoners,  reports  to  Secretary 
Stanton,  May  3,  1864: 

"The  enlisted  men  who  had  endured  so  many  privations  at 
Belle  Isle  were,  with  few  exceptions,  in  very  sad  plight  mentally 
and  physically,  having  for  months  been  exposed  to  all  the  changes 
of  the  weather,  with  an  allowance  of  food  scarcely  sufficient  to 
prevent  starvation,  even  if  of  wholesome  quality,  but  as  it  was 
...  if  it  did  not  kill  by  starvation  it  was  sure  to  do  it  by  the 
disease  it  created.  Some  of  these  poor  fellows  were  wasted  to 
mere  skeletons  and  had  scarcely  life  enough  remaining  to  appre- 
ciate that  they  were  now  in  the  hands  of  their  friends.  Many 
faces  showed  that  there  was  scarcely  a  ray  of  intelligence  left. 


292  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

That  our  soldiers,  when  in  the  hands  of  the  rebels,  are  starved  to 
death,  cannot  be  denied.  Every  returning  flag-of-truce  boat 
brings  too  many  living  and  dying  witnesses  to  admit  of  a  doubt 
of  this  terrible  fact.  .  .  .  While  a  practice  so  shocking  to 
humanity  is  persisted  in  by  the  rebel  authorities,  I  would  re- 
spectfully urge  that  retaliatory  measures  be  at  once  instituted." 

Let  us  turn  to  a  brighter  scene.  The  day  did  come  when 
the  door  opened  to  some  of  us.  It  was  a  Sunday  morning 
when  we  saw  the  rebel  troops  with  the  star  and  bar  battle 
flags  marching  through  the  city  toward  the  southwest,  and 
we  knew  that  they  were  withdrawing  from  the  front  of  our 
troops  advancing  up  the  James.  Then  we  heard  cannon  to 
the  southward  all  day,  and  finally  came  word  that  we  were 
to  go  down  by  flag-of-truce  boat  to  be  exchanged.  We  left 
Richmond  at  5  P.M.  Going  down  the  river  I  stood  with 
General  McLaughlen  and  Colonel  Robert  Quid,  the  rebel 
Commissioner  of  Exchange,  near  the  pilot  house.  This 
Colonel  Ould  deserves  notice  in  this  connection.  Through- 
out the  war  he  filled  this  position  and  was  the  chief  medium 
on  their  side,  as  Colonel  Mulford  was  on  ours,  through  whom 
the  two  governments  communicated  regarding  prisoners. 
His  letters  to  Mulford  are  often  long  and  argumentative. 
They  are  filled  with  the  high  flown  expressions  common  to 
many  Southerners,  and  with  repeated  denunciation  of  our 
(asserted)  brutal  treatment  of  their  men.  Of  their  sincerity, 
and  of  the  spirit  that  actuated  him  let  his  own  letters  speak. 

On  March  17,  1863,  he  writes  from  City  Point,  Va.,  to 
General  Winder  at  Richmond: 

"  I  wish  you  to  send  me  Wednesday  morning  all  the  military 
prisoners  you  have.  .  .  .  The  arrangement  I  have  made  works 
largely  in  our  favor.  We  get  rid  of  a  set  of  miserable  wretches 
and  receive  some  of  the  best  material  I  ever  saw. " 

On  March  21,  1863,  he  writes  from  Richmond  to  their 
Commissary-General,  Colonel  A.  C.  Myers,  as  follows: 

"If  the  exigencies  of  our  army  require  the  use  of  trains  for 


From  original  photographs.     The  Key  is  in  the  possession  of  Gen.  Edw.  H.  Ripley. 

i.  Facsimile  of  letter  of  Col.  Robert  Quid,  C.  S.  A.,  Commissioner 
of  Exchange  of  Prisoners,  containing  notorious  sentence  regarding 
condition  of  Union  prisoners.  2.  Key  of  the  Libby  Prison 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  2Q3 

the  transportation  of  corn,  pay  no  regard  to  the  Yankee  prisoners. 
I  would  rather  they  should  starve  than  our  own  people  suffer. 
I  suppose  I  can  safely  put  it  in  writing  '  Let  them  suffer. '  The 
words  are  memorable,  and  it  is  fortunate  in  this  case  they  can  be 
applied  properly.  Your  friend,  Robt.  Ould. " 

And  on  May  2,  1864,  he  writes  to  James  A.  Sedden, 
Secretary  of  War,  C.  S.  A.: 

"The  chief  difficulty  (in  exchanges)  is  the  inadmissible 
claim  of  the  enemy  that  recaptured  slaves  shall  be  treated  as 
prisoners  of  war.  As  yet  the  Federals  do  not  appear  to  have 
found  any  well-authenticated  case  of  the  retention  of  a  negro 
prisoner.  They  have  made  several  specific  inquiries,  but  in 
each  case  there  was  no  record  of  such  a  party,  and  I  so  responded. 
Having  no  especial  desire  to  find  any  such  case  it  is  more  than 
probable  the  same  answer  will  be  returned  to  every  such  inquiry. 
Respectfully,  Robt.  Ould,  Agent  of  Exchange." 

Finding  the  river  dangerous  from  torpedoes,  which  the 
pilot  said  had  been  shifted  by  spring  floods,  we  did  not 
attempt  to  reach  Varina  Landing  but  were  put  ashore  at  a 
bend  two  miles  above.  Our  general  gave  his  parole  for  all, 
and  we  started  to  march  overland  to  the  point  where  lay 
the  U.  S.  vessel.  The  ground  was  rolling  and  our  progress 
slow,  as  some  of  the  long-time  prisoners  could  hardly  walk, 
even  with  our  assistance.  At  last,  however,  we  mounted  a 
low  eminence  and  saw  before  us  a  sight,  the  meaning  of 
which  to  us  no  words  of  mine  can  convey  to  you.  On  the 
summit  of  the  next  hill,  with  the  setting  sun  shining  fair  upon 
it,  floated  the  Stars  and  Stripes,  and  around  it  were  clustered 
the  blue  uniforms  and  the  gleaming  gun-barrels  of  the  black 
troops  of  the  Army  of  the  James!  The  flag  was  there  to 
protect  us.  The  sturdy  arms  of  the  men  were  there  to  fight 
for  us.  Behind  them  lay  God's  country,  and  for  a  moment 
the  sufferings  of  the  past  were  forgotten.  What  it  meant 
to  those  enfeebled  men,  who  had  lost  nearly  all  that  manhood 
values  in  their  two  years  of  prison  life,  I  will  not  attempt  to 
express,  but  the  words  of  thankfulness  that  came  from  their 


294  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

trembling  lips  and  the  tears  that  rolled  down  from  eyes 
unused  to  weep,  told  the  story.  Companions,  we  have  heard 
and  sometimes  still  hear  of  "drawing  the  color  line,"  but  I 
say  to  you  that  we  saw  the  "color  line"  drawn  that  day,  and 
for  those  who  can  conceive  the  picture  of  those  colored  sol- 
diers interposing  their  sturdy  frames  as  a  bulwark  between 
that  body  of  enfeebled  white  men  and  the  brutal  enemies 
whom  they  had  left,  the  "color  line"  can  never  again  be 
drawn  in  any  other  way. 

We  went  down  the  river  that  night  on  Mulford's  boat, 
and  an  hour  after  sunset  passed  three  small  rebel  gunboats. 
On  the  after-deck  of  one  sat  the  rebel  Admiral  Semmes, 
formerly  the  commander  of  the  well-known  piratical  cruiser 
the  Alabama,  which  had  been  earlier  sunk  by  the  Kearsarge. 
He  probably  realized  at  this  moment  that  his  career  was 
ended.  About  midnight  the  sound  of  a  heavy  explosion 
reached  us,  and  we  learned  at  Fort  Monroe  next  day  that  he 
had  blown  up  his  three  vessels,  and  so  disappeared  from 
history  and  from  our  story. 

In  the  morning  we  touched  at  Fort  Monroe  where  we  were 
told  that  Richmond  was  captured,  and  another  day  found  us 
at  Parole  Camp,  Annapolis,  Maryland.  Our  experiences 
there  need  no  comment,  but  they  afforded  an  opportunity 
to  confirm  our  impressions  of  Southern  prisons.  Many 
hundreds  of  exchanged  men  were  being  received  by  steamer 
from  Wilmington,  North  Carolina,  and  from  Savannah 
and  Charleston.  These  men  had  been  brought  from  the 
Andersonville,  Salisbury,  and  Columbia  stockades,  and  words 
fail  to  express  the  sad  condition  of  many  of  them.  In  these 
cases  all  flesh  had  disappeared,  and  the  parchment-like  skin 
was  tightly  drawn  over  the  bony  frame.  The  legs  were  not 
larger  than  a  man's  forearm,  and  the  arms  were  the  size 
of  a  child's.  These  men  weighed  only  about  fifty  to  sixty 
pounds,  and  the  hospital  stewards  brought  them  from  the 
boat  two  at  a  time,  easily  carrying  one  on  each  arm.  Our 
hospitals  gave  them  every  care,  but  few  survived  to  reach 
their  homes  and  families,  and  of  those  who  did,  helpless 
invalidism  was,  in  many  cases,  their  lot. 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  295 

In  taking  a  broad  survey  of  the  question  of  "Prisoners 
of  War,"  one  is  at  once  impressed  with  the  complications 
introduced  by  the  unique  conditions  existing  in  our  War 
of  the  Rebellion  which  would  not  have  applied  in  a  war 
with  a  foreign  nation.  For  instance,  both  sides  claimed  the 
border  State  of  Kentucky,  and  parts  of  it  were  alternately 
within  our  lines  and  within  theirs.  Southern  officers  would 
return  to  their  former  homes  there  and  in  civilian  dress  visit 
friends,  obtain  military  information,  and  recruit  for  the 
rebel  army.  Captured  by  us  and  treated  as  spies,  they 
appealed  to  President  Davis  at  Richmond,  who  invariably 
sustained  their  claims  for  immunity  and  placed  an  equal 
number  of  our  officers  in  dark  cells  upon  bread  and  water 
and  under  sentence  of  death.  Again,  a  favorable  form  of 
warfare  with  them  was  guerilla  or  bushwhacking.  These 
parties  directed  their  raids  into  the  sections  where  they  had 
formerly  lived.  As  a  rule,  they  knew  no  mercy,  but  killed 
the  non-combatant,  the  old  and  young  indiscriminately, 
venting,  under  the  guise  of  war,  the  private  grudges  and 
personal  quarrels  that  had  previously  existed.  They  were 
without  uniform,  and  when  pursued  were  difficult  to  iden- 
tify from  the  rest  of  the  population.  Mosby's  guerillas  in 
Virginia  and  a  large  part  of  General  Sterling  Price's  army 
in  Missouri  were  of  this  class,  and  our  uniformed  officers 
and  men  were  on  repeated  occasions  shot  by  them  in  cold 
blood  after  surrender.  When  we  captured  these  guerilla 
murderers  and  condemned  them  by  court-martial,  Mr. 
Davis  again  came  to  their  rescue,  declaring  them  to  be  of 
his  regular  forces  and  threatening  retaliation.  These  bodies 
of  men  owed  their  existence  to  the  regular  action  of  the 
Confederate  Congress.  April  21,  1862,  that  body  duly 
authorized  President  Davis  "to  commission  such  officers 
as  he  may  deem  proper  with  authority  to  form  bands  of 
partizan  rangers,  in  companies,  battalions,  or  regiments, 
either  as  infantry  or  cavalry";  and  on  May  17,  1862,  the 
Virginia  Legislature  further  enacted: 

"  Whereas,  this  Assembly  places  a  high  estimate  upon  the  value 


2Q6  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

of  ranger  or  partizan  service,  and  regards  it  as  perfectly  legiti- 
mate; and  it  being  understood  that  a  Federal  Commander  has 
intimated  his  purpose,  if  such  service  is  not  discontinued,  to 
lay  waste  by  fire  a  portion  of  our  territory,  be  it  resolved,  that 
the  policy  of  employing  such  rangers  or  partizans  ought  to  be 
carried  out  energetically  without  the  slightest  regard  to  such 
threats." 

A  conspicuous  instance  occurred  in  October,  1864,  in 
Missouri.  General  Price  turned  over  to  Tim  Reeves,  a 
well-known  guerilla,  Major  James  Wilson  and  six  enlisted 
men  of  the  3d  Missouri  Cavalry  who  had  been  captured  by 
his  command.  Reeves  caused  the  seven  men  to  be  shot. 
In  retaliation  an  equal  number  of  rebel  prisoners  were 
executed  in  St.  Louis  as  soon  as  the  facts  had  been  fully 
verified. 

But  the  greatest  difficulty  arose  from  the  different  status 
of  the  negro  soldier  in  the  two  sections;  viz.,  in  the  South, 
assumed  to  be  a  slave,  and  in  the  North,  a  uniformed  soldier 
of  the  U.  S.  Army  and  entitled  to  be  treated  as  a  prisoner  of 
war. 

Early  in  the  conflict,  Francis  Lieber,  LL.D.,  a  high  au- 
thority in  international  law  and  usage,  compiled  for  our  Gov- 
ernment in  great  detail  a  war  code  covering  all  military 
and  naval  subjects.  This  was  issued  as  general  instructions 
to  our  troops  everywhere,  and  formed  the  basis  upon  which 
we  fought  the  war.  This  Code  deserves  more  than  a  pass- 
ing notice.  It  was  so  broad,  just,  humane,  and  altogether 
admirable  that  it  has  elicited  most  favorable  comments  from 
European  jurists  on  international  law.  One  of  the  most 
distinguished  of  these,  Ernest  Nys,  Professor  of  the  Univer- 
sity, Counsellor  of  the  Court  of  Appeals  of  Brussels,  and 
Member  of  the  Permanent  Court  of  Arbitration  at  The  Hague, 
has  recently  paid  it  a  high  tribute.  In  a  pamphlet  on  the 
subject  of  a  "Permanent  International  Tribunal,"  he  says, 
"Another  service  rendered  by  the  United  States  is  not  suffi- 
ciently appreciated,  namely  the  promulgation  by  President 
Lincoln  of  'The  Instructions  for  the  Government  of  Armies 
of  the  United  States  in  the  Field/  drawn  up  by  Francis 


From  original  photograph  in  possession  of  the  Author. 

Sample  of  coal  loaded  with  dynamite  to  be  smuggled  on  board  Union 
merchant  vessels  by  order  of  the  Confederate  authorities 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  297 

Lieber.  They  have  exercised  a  powerful  influence  upon  the 
entire  world,  for  they  were  the  basis  of  the  work  of  tne 
Conference  of  Brussels  in  1874,  and  through  this  conference 
became  the  fundamental  text  of  the  conventions  concerning 
the  laws  of  war  adopted  by  The  Hague  Conferences  of  1899 
and  1907."  But  the  Confederate  Government  claimed 
the  right  to  construe  international  usage  in  its  application 
to  their  affairs,  and  to  make  such  departures  from  it  as 
seemed  best  to  them,  and  as  their  situation  became  more 
desperate  we  find,  by  their  official  records,  that  they  sanc- 
tioned many  acts  which  at  other  times  they  would  probably 
not  have  attempted  to  justify.  For  instance,  we  find  Mr. 
Davis  telling  John  Surratt  in  Richmond  that  to  kill  President 
Lincoln  did  not  differ  from  killing  any  Union  soldier  in  arms; 
that  the  seizing  of  steamers  on  Lake  Erie  and  killing  the 
crew,  and  the  attempted  burning  of  New  York  were  justi- 
fiable acts  of  war. 

But  to  return  to  the  colored  troops.  In  1862,  the  United 
States  began  the  enlistment  of  colored  troops,  and  in  Decem- 
ber, President  Davis  addressed  the  Confederate  Congress 
on  the  subject.  That  Congress  at  once  enacted  a  law. 
Upon  this  Davis,  on  December  23,  1862,  issued  a  proclama- 
tion, from  which  I  abstract  the  following : 

"Finally  the  African  slaves  have  not  only  been  incited  to 
insurrection  by  every  license  and  encouragement,  but  numbers 
of  them  have  actually  been  armed  for  a  servile  war — a  war  in  its 
nature  far  exceeding  in  horrors  the  most  merciless  atrocities  of 
the  savages.  .  .  .  Now,  therefore,  I  issue  this  proclamation  and 
do  order  .  .  .  That  all  negro  slaves  captured  in  arms  be  at 
once  delivered  over  to  the  executive  authorities  of  the  respective 
States  to  which  they  belong,  to  be  dealt  with  according  to  the  laws 
of  those  States,  and,  that  the  like  orders,  be  executed  in  all  cases 
with  respect  to  all  commissioned  officers  of  the  United  States 
when  found  serving  in  company  with  armed  slaves  in  insurrection 
against  the  authorities  of  the  different  States  of  this  Confederacy." 

On  January  12,  1863,  he  addressed  the  following  to  the 
Confederate  Congress: 


298  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

".  .  .  So  far  as  regards  the  action  of  this  Government  on 
such  criminals  as  may  attempt  its  execution  (leading  colored 
troops)  I  confine  myself  to  saying  .  .  .  that  I  shall  deliver  to  the 
several  State  authorities  all  commissioned  officers  of  the  United 
States  that  may  hereafter  be  captured  by  our  forces  in  any  of  the 
States  embraced  in  my  proclamation,  that  they  may  be  dealt 
with  in  accordance  with  the  laws  of  those  States  providing 
for  the  punishment  of  criminals  engaged  in  inciting  servile 
insurrection.' 

May  i,  1863,  the  Confederate  Congress  adopted  resolu- 
tions from  which  I  quote: 

"That  every  white  person  being  a  commissioned  officer 
.  .  .  who  shall  command  negroes  or  mulattoes  in  arms  against 
the  Confederate  States  .  .  .  shall  be  deemed  as  inciting  servile 
insurrection,  and  if  captured,  shall  be  put  to  death  ...  at  the 
discretion  of  the  Court. " 

The  United  States  stood  loyally  by  its  colored  troops.  It 
first  demonstrated  by  the  laws  and  practice  of  all  nations, 
and  from  the  Roman  code  to  those  of  modern  times,  that 
slaves  once  freed  in  war  received  the  status  of  freemen,  and 
could  not  again  be  relegated  to  their  former  condition.  It 
then  notified  the  Confederate  Government  that  we  should 
retaliate  strictly  and  in  kind  if  Davis's  threat  was  executed. 
As  a  consequence  of  this,  and  as  the  rebels  refused  there- 
after to  exchange  colored  soldiers  or  their  officers,  exchanges 
ceased  and  were  not  generally  resumed  until  the  spring  of 
1864.  The  first  exchange  of  officers  of  colored  troops 
occurred  October  Qth  of  that  year. 

To  avoid  the  complications  and  publicity  which  must 
have  resulted  from  court  trials  and  the  condemnation  of  our 
men  as  criminals,  our  antagonists  resorted  to  a  shorter,  but 
not  less  effective,  method.  The  charge  of  killing  prisoners 
after  capture  is  a  very  serious  one  to  bring  against  the  men 
of  any  civilized  nation,  and  the  writer  fully  realizes  the 
gravity  of  it.  But  it  is  impossible  to  read  the  correspon- 
dence between  the  Confederate  officials  and  consider  simul- 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  299 

taneously  the  evidence  of  the  acts  committed,  without 
reaching  the  conclusion  that  the  rebel  troops,  officers  and 
men,  understood  that  such  acts  would  not  be  investigated, 
criticised  or  condemned  by  their  authorities,  but,  on  the  con- 
trary, would  afford  the  easiest  solution  of  a  vexing  prob- 
lem. The  record  also  shows  that  the  enlisted  men 
(colored)  when  not  killed  were,  in  many  instances,  sold 
as  slaves. 

The  inconsistency  and  insincerity,  to  use  no  stronger 
words,  of  the  attitude  of  the  rebel  government,  are  shown 
by  the  letter  of  Colonel  Ludlow,  U.  S.  A.,  exchange  agent 
to  Colonel  Ould,  the  rebel  commissioner,  June  14,  1863. 
Ludlow  says: 

"...  Before  a  single  negro  was  mustered  into  the  U.  S. 
service  you  had  Indians  and  negroes  organized  in  arms  under 
Albert  Pike,  in  Arkansas,  and  .  .  .  subsequently  negroes  were 
captured  (by  us)  at  Antietam  and  delivered  as  prisoners  of  war 
to  you  at  Aiken's  Landing  and  receipted  for  and  counted  in  the 
exchange.  More  recently  the  Tennessee  Legislature  passed  an 
act  forcing  into  military  service  all  free  male  persons  of  color 
between  the  ages  of  fifteen  and  fifty. " 

In  support  of  what  I  have  said  as  to  killing  prisoners, 
the  slaughter  of  a  large  number  by  the  command  under  the 
rebel  General  Forrest,  at  Fort  Pillow,  calls  for  especial 
comment,  as  the  facts  are  well  established  and  to  my  knowl- 
edge have  never  been  successfully  denied.  I  quote  from 
the  Congressional  report  "On  the  Conduct  of  the  War," 
which  adds  that  all  the  statements  are  supported  by 
abundant  and  unimpeachable  evidence: 

"  General  Forrest  appeared  before  Fort  Pillow  sixty-five  miles 
above  Memphis,  on  April  12,  1864.  The  garrison  consisted  of 
nineteen  officers  and  538  men,  of  whom  262  were  negroes.  Ma- 
jor L.  F.  Booth  was  in  command  and  after  his  death  Major  W. 
F.  Bradford  succeeded  him.  After  an  engagement  of  some  hours, 
a  flag  of  truce  was  sent  in  by  Forrest,  demanding  unconditional 
surrender.  The  rebel  troops,  in  violation  of  the  flag  and  while 


300  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

protected  by  it,  followed  it  closely  and  obtained  positions  within 
one  hundred  yards  of  the  fort.  The  demand  for  surrender  upon 
these  terms  was  declined  by  Major  Bradford,  whereupon  the 
rebels  stormed  the  fortifications  shouting,  '  No  quarter! '  There 
followed  a  scene  of  cruelty  and  murder  without  a  parallel  in 
civilized  warfare,  which  needed  but  the  tomahawk  and  scalping 
knife  to  exceed  the  worst  atrocities  ever  committed  by  savages. 
The  rebels  began  an  indiscriminate  slaughter,  sparing  neither  age 
nor  sex,  white  nor  black,  soldier  nor  civilian.  The  officers  and 
men  seemed  to  vie  with  each  other  in  the  work;  men,  women, 
and  even  children  were  deliberately  shot  down,  beaten  and  hacked 
with  sabres.  Some  of  the  children,  not  more  than  ten  years  old, 
were  forced  to  stand  and  face  their  murderers  while  being  shot; 
the  sick  and  wounded  were  butchered  without  mercy,  the  rebels 
entering  the  hospital  and  dragging  them  out  to  be  shot,  or  killing 
them  as  they  lay  unable  to  offer  resistance.  Numbers  of  our 
men  were  collected  in  lines  or  groups  and  deliberately  shot;  some 
were  shot  in  the  river;  some  on  the  bank,  and  the  bodies  of  the 
latter,  many  yet  living,  were  kicked  into  the  river.  The  huts 
and  tents  where  the  wounded  had  sought  shelter  were  set  on  fire, 
both  that  night  and  the  next  morning,  while  the  wounded  were 
still  in  them,  and  those  who  tried  to  get  out  were  shot.  One 
man  was  fastened  to  the  floor  of  a  tent  by  nails  through  his 
clothing  and  then  burned,  and  one  was  similarly  nailed  to  the 
side  of  a  building  and  then  burned.  These  deeds  were  renewed 
the  next  morning  when  any  wounded  who  still  lived  were  sought 
out  and  shot.  Of  the  400  known  to  have  been  killed,  at  least 
300  were  murdered  in  cold  blood  after  the  post  was  in  possession 
of  the  rebels  and  our  men  had  surrendered.  Major  Bradford 
was  held  until  the  following  day,  and  then  on  the  march  to  Jack- 
son was  taken  from  the  ranks  by  a  rebel  officer  and  five  soldiers, 
and  shot  in  the  presence  of  the  command." 


Forrest  states  that  he  "buried  228  Federals  the  evening  of 
the  assault."  Colonel  Chalmere,  his  second  in  command, 
was  conspicuous  for  urging  on  his  men  and  personally  par- 
ticipating in  the  murder  of  the  prisoners. 

The  following  are  also  typical.  I  shall  give  but  few 
instances  in  the  West  and  in  the  East  to  show  that  the 
enforcement  of  this  policy  was  not  limited  to  one  locality, 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  301 

but  was  of  general  application;  they  could  be  multiplied 
indefinitely. 

On  June  13,  1863,  at  Shreveport,  Louisiana,  Lieutenant- 
General  E.  Kirby  Smith,  C.  S.  A.,  wrote  to  Major-General 
Tayler,  C.  S.  A.,  as  follows: 

"  I  have  been  informed  that  some  of  your  troops  have  cap- 
tured negroes  in  arms.  I  hope  this  may  not  be  so,  and  that 
your  subordinates  in  command  of  capturing  parties  may  have 
recognized  the  propriety  of  giving  no  quarter  to  armed  negroes 
and  their  officers ;  in  this  way  we  may  be  relieved  from  a  dis- 
agreeable dilemma." 

On  the  same  day  his  Adjutant-General  writes: 

"Referring  to  what  disposition  should  be  made  of  negro 
slaves  taken  in  arms,  I  am  directed  by  Lieutenant-General  Smith 
to  say  no  quarter  should  be  shown  to  them." 

On  the  1 6th,  General  Smith  clinches  the  matter  and 
leaves  no  doubt  in  the  minds  of  the  rebel  leaders  by  sending 
copies  of  his  letter  (as  above)  to  S.  Cooper,  Adjutant  and 
Inspector-General  at  Richmond. 

July  n,  1864,  Samuel  Johnson,  Orderly  Sergeant,  Co.  D, 
2d  U.  S.  Colored  Cavalry,  testified  before  John  Cassels, 
Captain  U.  S.  A.,  and  Provost  Marshal: 

1 '  I  was  captured  at  Plymouth ,  N .  C.  I  pulled  off  my  uniform 
and  got  a  citizen's  suit.  Upon  the  capture  of  the  town  all 
negroes  found  in  blue  uniform  were  killed.  I  saw  some  taken 
to  the  woods  and  hung;  others  stood  on  the  banks  of  the  river 
and  were  shot  and  others  had  their  brains  beat  out  with  the 
butts  of  muskets." 

On  February  16,  1864  at  Port  Hudson,  La.,  General 
George  L.  Andrews,  U.  S.  A.,  writes  to  General  Wirt  Adams, 
C.  S.  A.: 

"It  is  reported  to  me  that  several  of  the  U.  S.  colored  troops 
have  been  shot  by  the  Confederate  soldiers  after  capture,  and  a 


302  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

citizen  of  Jackson  has  made  oath  that  he  saw  Lieutenant  Shat- 
tuck  of  Scott's  Cavalry  dismount  and  deliberately  shoot  dead  a 
wounded  U.  S.  colored  soldier  lying  on  the  ground;  also  that  he 
heard  Shattuck  say  he  had  shot  thirteen  negro  prisoners  that  day. 
There  was  no  fighting  on  the  day  referred  to.  Also  that  he  saw 
Confederate  soldiers  take  negro  soldiers  out  of  town  to  shoot 
them,  as  they  said,  and  he  afterward  saw  the  bodies  a  mile  and  a 
half  distant  from  any  battlefield.  I  can  no  longer  doubt  that 
U.  S.  colored  soldiers  have  been  deliberately  murdered  by  your 
men  after  capture." 

On  December  20,  1864,  Lieutenant  Geo.  W.  Fitch,  I2th 
U.  S.  Colored  Infantry,  with  Lieutenant  Cooke,  same 
regiment,  and  Captain  Penfield,  44th  U.  S.  Colored  Infantry, 
were  captured  near  Murfreesboro  by  a  detachment  of 
General  Forrest's  command  (C.  S.  A.).  They  were  robbed 
of  everything  of  value,  including  much  of  their  clothing. 
Two  days  after,  while  riding  under  guard  along  the  pike 
road  from  Lewisburg  to  Mooresville,  all  three  were  shot 
through  the  head  by  their  guards  and  left  for  dead.  Fitch 
alone  survived,  being  concealed  and  saved  by  compassionate 
people  of  the  neighborhood.  The  facts,  which  are  well  estab- 
lished, were  made  the  subject  of  correspondence  between  the 
commanding  generals,  and  were  not  denied  by  Forrest. 
General  George  H.  Thomas,  addressing  General  Hood,  C.  S. 
A.,  closes  his  letter  thus: 

"Should  my  troops,  exasperated  by  such  acts,  take  no 
prisoners  of  war  in  future,  I  shall  in  no  manner  interfere. 
Your  army  and  not  mine  is  responsible  for  the  inauguration 
of  this  dreadful  policy  of  extermination." 

On  March  14,  1865,  General  Grant  wrote  General 
Lee  calling  his  attention  to  the  murder  of  these  officers 
and  adds: 

"Of  the  skirmish  at  Milliken's  Bend,  La.,  reliable  in- 
formation has  been  received  which  convinces  me  that  all 
the  white  officers  (U.  S.)  captured  were  put  to  death. " 

Further  confirmation  of  a  high  character  is  found  as 
early  as  May  23,  1863,  in  a  letter  from  Major-General 
D.  Hunter,  U.  S.  A.,  at  Hilton  Head  to  President  Lincoln, 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  303 

asking  that  certain  rebel  prisoners  be  delivered  to  him  as 
hostages  for  the  lives  of  his  men.    He  says: 

"The  retaliation  resolutions,  announced  by  the  Charleston 
Mercury  as  having  been  passed  by  the  rebel  Congress,  condemn 
to  death,  if  captured,  all  white  officers  acting  with  colored  troops, 
thus  condemning  to  death  every  officer  of  my  command.  This 
declaration  would  seem  to  be  only  a  formal  announcement  of 
what  has  for  some  time  been  the  practice  in  the  Western 
departments. " 

In  November  of  the  same  year  General  Halleck  then 
General-in-Chief,  U.  S.  A.,  writes  to  Edwin  M.  Stanton, 
Secretary  of  War,  as  follows: 

"On  the  22d  of  July,  1862,  General  Dix  and  General  Hill 
(C.  S.  A.),  entered  into  a  cartel  for  the  exchange  of  prisoners 
during  the  existing  war,  defining  the  meaning  of  a  parole,  the 
rights  and  obligations  of  prisoners,  and  how  they  should  be 
released  from  these  obligations.  Special  agreements  of  this 
kind  (duly  authorized  as  in  this  case),  explaining  the  general  laws 
of  war,  furnish  the  rules  of  conduct  for  the  contracting  parties. 
.  .  .  Finding  that  the  rebel  authorities  were  .  .  .  extorting 
by  threats  and  ill-treatment  unauthorized  paroles  from  our 
men,  and  they  refusing  to  exchange  colored  prisoners  or  their 
officers,  and  it  being  stated  that  the  former  were  being  sold  into 
slavery  and  the  latter  sentenced  to  imprisonment  and  death,  the 
rebel  authorities  were  notified  (of  these  violations)  and  all 
exchanges  ceased.  In  further  violation  of  good  faith  and  engage- 
ments solemnly  entered  into,  the  rebel  commissioner  then 
declared  as  exchanged  all  his  own  paroled  men  and  ordered  them 
to  their  regiments  then  in  the  field. 

"Rebel  prisoners  held  by  the  United  States  have  been  uni- 
formly treated  with  kindness.  They  have  been  furnished  with 
clothing  and  the  same  quality  and  amount  of  food  as  our  own 
soldiers,  while  our  men,  when  captured,  have  been  stripped  of 
blankets,  clothes,  and  shoes  even  in  the  winter  season.  They 
have  been  confined  in  loathsome  prisons,  half  fed  on  damaged 
provisions,  or  actually  starved  to  death,  hundreds  ending  their 
existence  loaded  with  irons.  In  fine,  the  treatment  of  our  prison- 
ers by  the  rebel  authorities  has  been  more  barbarous  than  that 


304  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

which  Christian  captives  suffered  from  the  pirates  of  Algiers; 
and  the  horrors  of  'Belle  Isle'  and  'Libby  Prison'  exceed  even 
those  of  the  'British  Hulks'  or  the  'Black  Hole  of  Calcutta.' 
This  atrocious  conduct  is  applauded  by  the  people  and  com- 
mended by  the  Richmond  Press  'as  a  means  of  reducing  the 
Yankee  ranks.'" 

In  this  connection  the  following  is  illuminating.  Gov- 
ernor Bonham,  of  South  Carolina,  writes  on  August  23,  1864, 
to  Sedden,  Secretary  of  War,  C.  S.  A.  : 

"  I  have  your  reply  recommending  that  captured  free  negroes 
be  not  brought  to  trial,  and  have  suspended  further  action.  I 
may  add  that  in  the  cases  of  slaves  of  this  State  so  offending, 
which  have  occurred  before  similar  courts,  the  offending  have 
been  executed." 

It  should  also  be  noted  that  the  rebels  did  not  hesitate 
to  force  captured  negro  soldiers  to  work  on  their  entrench- 
ments, under  fire,  an  act  forbidden  by  the  rules  of  civilized 
warfare.  Finding  this  to  be  the  case,  in  some  hundred 
instances,  General  Butler  advised  General  Grant  who 
replied  October  12,  1864,  approving  of  the  employment  of 
rebel  prisoners  in  the  same  way,  and  sent  to  Butler  a  number 
for  that  purpose.  This  had  the  effect  expected.  October 
I9th,  General  Lee  withdrew  the  colored  soldiers  from  labor 
in  the  trenches. 

I  do  not  wish  to-night  to  lead  you  through  a  "chamber 
of  horrors,"  but  this  brief  resume  would  be  incomplete  with- 
out some  notice  of  the  notorious  "stockade"  prisons  of  the 
South ;  but  I  shall  be  brief,  and  my  authorities  will  be  chiefly 
from  rebel  sources.  "Out  of  their  own  mouths  shall  ye 
condemn  them. " 

The  best  known  of  these  prisons  were  Andersonville 
and  Millen,  Georgia;  Columbia  (Camp  Sorghum)  and 
Florence,  South  Carolina;  Salisbury,  North  Carolina; 
Tuscaloosa,  Alabama;  Belle  Island  in  the  James  River, 
Virginia;  and  Camp  Ford,  Texas.  The  conditions  were 
much  the  same  in  all.  There  were  no  barracks  in  most 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  305 

cases,  even  for  the  sick  and  wounded.  Often  the  prisoners 
were  not  allowed  to  build  cabins,  even  where,  as  at  Ander- 
sonville,  timber  was  plentiful.  They  erected  small  huts  of 
boughs,  put  a  piece  of  a  shelter  tent  on  sticks,  or  dug  holes 
in  the  ground.  They  were  densely  crowded.  In  1864, 
Andersonville  contained  in  its  sixteen  acres  35,000  men,  by 
their  official  report,  which  allowed  a  space  of  three  feet  by 
two  to  each  man.  Very  few  cooking  utensils  were  provided, 
and  the  food  was  furnished  usually  in  a  raw  condition.  Fuel 
was  so  scarce  that  the  prisoners  dug  up  the  earth  for  roots, 
and  what  cooking  they  did  was  to  warm  the  coarse  meal  on  a 
stone  or  a  piece  of  a  tin  can.  The  amount  given  was  very 
small  and  inadequate,  as  the  result  showed,  to  maintain 
life.  No  blankets  or  clothing  were  supplied.  Often  no 
sinks  were  provided.  The  water  was  often  impure.  The 
sickness  and  mortality  were  appalling.  Prisoners  were 
frequently  shot  without  cause  by  the  rebel  officers  and 
guard,  in  a  spirit  of  malice  or  as  a  vindictive  display  of 
power,  and  often  the  act  was  accompanied  by  the  lan- 
guage of  hatred  and  sometimes,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  of 
levity. 

Let  us  call  the  witnesses.  H.  C.  Trumbull,  Chaplain, 
loth  Conn.  Vols.,  writes  November  17,  1863,  to  Colonel 
Hoffman,  Commissary  of  Prisoners,  Washington: 

"At  Belle  Isle  a  large  proportion  of  our  privates  are  without 
tents,  barracks,  or  any  shelter,  herded  like  cattle  on  the  cold, 
wet  sand,  lacking  blankets,  clothing,  and  sufficient  food.  Men 
are  dying  at  the  rate  of  ten  a  day.  Of  14  brought  in  one  evening 
9  died  before  morning.  The  day's  ration  was  a  piece  of  coarse 
bread  5  by  2%  by  3  inches.  A  Confederate  official  said  to  me: 
4  It  is  a  hard  thing  to  say  to  you,  but  your  men  on  Belle  Isle  are 
dying  of  starvation.'  Another  Confederate  officer  said  to  me, 
1  The  Island  is  a  perfect  slaughter  pen  for  your  men. ' " 

G.  Wm.  Semple,  Surgeon,  C.  S.  A.,  previously  quoted  in 
another  connection,  reports  about  Belle  Isle,  March  6,  1864: 

"  An  area  sufficient  for  3000  has  now  from  6000  to  10,000 
men  in  it.  The  whole  surface  of  the  camp  is  saturated  with 


306  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

putrid  animal  matter.  The  bread  is  corn-meal,  unsifted  or 
bolted,  and  greatly  increases  disease. " 

On  May  5,  1864,  Gen.  Howell  Cobb,  C.  S.  A.,  writes 
of  Andersonville,  to  Adjutant-General  Cooper,  Richmond: 

"The  prison  is  already  too  much  crowded;  the  effect  of 
increasing  the  number  within  the  present  area  must  be  a 
terrible  increase  of  sickness  and  death  during  the  summer." 
There  were  then  12,000  imprisoned.  During  the  summer  it 
was  increased  to  35,000! 

On  June  6,  1864,  the  same  officer  reports  on  the  subject 
of  prisoners  to  James  A.  Sedden,  Secretary  of  War,  Rich- 
mond, asking  orders.  The  communication  was  endorsed  by 
Sedden,  June  I3th,  and  a  part  of  the  endorsement  reads: 
"As  to  the  white  officers  serving  with  negro  troops,  we 
ought  never  to  be  inconvenienced  with  such  prisoners." 

May  6,  1864,  E.  J.  Eldridge,  Chief  Surgeon,  C.  S.  A., 
writes  of  Andersonville:  "Their  shelters  consist  of  such  as 
they  can  make  of  boughs  of  trees,  poles,  etc.,  covered  with 
dirt.  .  .  .  Few  would  attempt  to  escape  .  .  .  and  would 
be  readily  caught  by  the  dogs,  always  at  hand  for  that 
purpose." 

In  May,  1864,  Isaiah  H.  White,  Chief  Surgeon,  C.  S.  A., 
whose  name  appears  frequently  in  the  records  of  Anderson- 
ville, writes: 

"The  total  number  of  cases  treated  here  to  date  is  4588, 
of  which  1026  (about  25%)  have  died.  The  month  of  April 
exhibits  a  ratio  of  316  cases  and  57  deaths  to  each  1000. " 

In  August,  he  adds : 

"The  prisoners  are  without  barracks  or  tents,  30,000  men 
being  densely  crowded  together.  They  are  exposed  to  the 
sun  by  day  and  the  dew  at  night,  and  entirely  unprotected 
during  rains.  The  hospital  (small  tents)  is  utterly  inadequate 
(in  number  and  size)  to  accommodate  the  large  number  of 
sick." 

This  being  a  monthly  estimate  means  that  68%  of  the 
entire  population  would  die  in  twelve  months. 

That  conditions  became  not  better,  but  worse,  as  time 
went  by,  is  shown  by  the  report  of  Walter  Bowie,  Captain 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR 


307 


and  Inspector,  C.  S.  A.,  to  Brigadier-General  Chilton,  Rich- 
mond, May  10,  1864.  Confirming  the  above  he  writes: 

"The  number  of  deaths  during  the  week  ending  May  8th 
was  131,  or  1 8  per  day  ...  a  considerable  increase  .  .  . 
which  will  continue  unless  a  decided  improvement  is  made." 

May  25,  1864,  Major  Turner  writes  from  Andersonville 
to  General  Winder: 

"Buildings  .  .  .  or  tents  should  be  furnished.  Without 
this  they  will  die  by  hundreds  and  be  a  dead  loss  to  us  in 
the  way  of  exchange.'1 

The  expression,  "We  now  have  them  where,  with  the 
severity  of  the  climate  and  harsh  treatment,  nature  will  do 
its  work  faster  than  the  bullet,"  is  found  more  than  once, 
in  varying  phrase,  in  the  mouths  of  Confederate  officials, 
and  Winder's  (the  son  of  the  General)  remark  to  Ambrose 
Spencer,  a  Confederate  gentleman  from  Americus,  Ga., 
"that  he  would  make  of  Andersonville  a  pen  that  would  kill 
more  d — d  Yankees  than  could  be  killed  at  the  front,"  is 
typical  of  a  large  class. 

In  refreshing  contrast  to  the  spirit  of  callous  calculating 
cruelty,  that  forms  the  staple  of  these  records,  are  the  occa- 
sional gleams  of  pity  and  humanity  that  appear  among  them. 
Of  such  is  the  following.  On  June  23, 1864,  a  rebel  private, 
James  E.  Anderson,  on  guard  at  Andersonville  wrote  to 
Jefferson  Davis: 

"I  am  a  private  in  the  ranks  at  this  place.  ...  I  would  in- 
form you  of  things  I  know  you  are  ignorant  of .  ...  I  have  no 
cause  to  love  the  Yankees.  .  .  .  Twelve  feet  inside  the  walls  is 
a  dead  line.  .  .  .  We  have  many  thoughtless  boys  who  think 
the  killing  of  a  Yankee  will  make  them  great  men.  .  .  .  Every 
day  or  two  there  are  prisoners  shot.  When  the  officer  of  the 
guard  comes  there  is  a  dead  or  badly  wounded  man  invariably 
with  their  own  lines.  The  sentry  is  told  he  did  exactly  right 
and  is  a  good  sentry.  Last  Sabbath  two  were  shot  in  their 
tents  at  one  shot.  Let  a  good  man  come  and  mix  with  the 
prisoners,  and  he  will  find  things  revolting  to  humanity."  [En- 
dorsed] "Referred  by  the  President  to  the  Secretary  of  War. 
Referred  by  him  to  General  Winder." 


308  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

Meantime  the  increased  number  of  prisoners  more  than 
kept  pace  with  the  inroads  of  disease,  and  conditions  grew 
steadily  worse.  June  26,  1864,  Surgeon  White  reports  25,000 
prisoners,  3,000  sick,  only  five  surgeons,  and  begs  for  ten 
additional  doctors.  In  August,  1864,  Captain  H.  Wirz, 
commanding  prison,  reports  deaths  during  July,  1742; 
prisoners  on  hand,  31,678.  In  September,  he  reports  deaths 
in  August,  2993. 

But  most  conclusive,  because  of  the  high  rank  of  the 
writers,  are  the  following.  August  5,  1864,  Colonel  D.  T. 
Chandler,  Inspector-General,  C.  S.  A.,  reports  to  Colonel 
R.  H.  Chilton,  Inspector-General,  C.  S.  A.,  Richmond,  from 
Andersonville: 

"The  acreage  gives  somewhat  less  than  six  square  feet  to 
each  prisoner  (that  is,  2  feet  by  3).  Many  (bodies)  are  carted 
out  daily.  .  .  whom  the  medical  officers  have  never  seen.  .  .  . 
The  dead  are  hauled  out  daily  by  wagon  loads  and  buried  without 
coffins,  their  hands  in  many  instances  being  first  mutilated  with 
an  axe  in  the  removal  of  any  finger  rings  they  may  have.  It  is 
impossible  to  state  the  number  of  sick,  many  dying  whom  the 
medical  officers  neither  see  nor  hear  of  until  the  remains  are 
brought  out  for  burial.  .  .  .  Raw  rations  have  been  issued  to  a 
large  proportion,  who  are  entirely  unprovided  with  proper  uten- 
sils and  have  so  limited  a  supply  of  fuel  that  they  dig  with  their 
hands  in  the  filthy  marsh  for  roots.  No  soap  or  clothing  has 
ever  been  issued.  I  am  confident  that  by  slight  exertions  green 
corn  and  other  antiscorbutics  could  readily  be  obtained.  My 
duty  requires  me  respectfully  to  recommend  a  change  in  the 
officer  in  command  (over  Captain  Wirz),  Brigadier-General  J.  H. 
Winder,  and  the  substitution  of  some  one  who  unites  energy  and 
good  judgment  with  some  feelings  of  humanity  and  considera- 
tion for  the  welfare  and  comfort  (so  far  as  consistent  with  safe- 
keeping) of  the  vast  number  of  unfortunates  placed  under  his 
control.  Some  one  who  at  least  will  not  advocate  deliberately 
and  in  cold  blood  the  propriety  of  leaving  them  in  their  present 
condition  until  their  number  has  been  sufficiently  reduced  by 
death  to  make  the  present  arrangements  suffice  for  their  accommo- 
dation, and  who  will  not  consider  it  a  matter  of  self-laudation 
and  boasting,  that  he  has  never  been  inside  the  stockade,  the 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  309 

horrors  of  which  it  is  difficult  to  describe,  which  is  a  disgrace  to 
civilization,  and  the  condition  of  which,  by  a  little  energy,  and 
even  with  the  limited  means  at  his  command,  he  might  have 
considerably  improved. " 

This  report  is  approved  in  all  particulars  under  date  of 
November  22,  1864,  by  W.  Carvel  Hall,  Major,  C.  S.  A., 
who  accompanied  Chandler.  It  is  endorsed:  "The  con- 
dition of  this  prison  is  a  reproach  to  us  as  a  nation. — 
R.  H.  Chilton,  Inspector-General."  And:  "The  suffer- 
ings of  the  prisoners  seem  almost  incredible.  The  frightful 
percentage  of  mortality  appears  a  consequence  of  the  criminal 
indifference  of  the  authorities.  .  .  .  These  reports  show  a 
condition  which  calls  loudly  for  the  interposition  of  the 
Department. — J.  A.  Campbell,  Assistant  Secretary  of  "War, 
C.  S.  A." 

During  the  trial  of  Wirz  in  Washington  at  the  close  of 
the  war,  Colonel  Chandler  appeared  before  the  Board  of 
Officers  constituting  the  court  and  corroborated  the  above 
with  many  additional  details.  He  was  an  officer  who  had 
been  educated  at  West  Point  and  his  testimony,  given  in  a 
frank,  straightforward  way,  made  a  deep  impression  on  the 
Court.  He  swore  that  he  wrote  the  report  quoted  above, 
and  that  the  statements  embodied  in  it  were  true  of  his 
own  knowledge. 

The  other  witnesses  of  equal  importance,  and  the  last 
I  shall  summon  are  Drs.  Joseph  Jones  and  J.  C.  Bates,  of 
the  Medical  Department,  C.  S.  A.  Of  Dr.  Jones,  Jefferson 
Davis  writing  to  Bedford's  Magazine  in  January,  1870, 
says  he  was  "eminent  in  his  profession  and  of  great  learning 
and  probity."  In  August,  1864,  Dr.  Jones  was  sent  to 
Andersonville  to  investigate  and  report  to  Surgeon-General 
Moore.  He  did  so.  At  the  Wirz  trial  he  was  a  witness, 
and  under  oath  corroborated  his  report,  which  was  in  evi- 
dence. From  this  report  I  quote  briefly: 

"  I  visited  two  thousand  sick  within  the  stockade  lying  under 
some  long  sheds.  .  .  .  At  this  time  only  one  medical  officer  was  in 
attendance,  whereas  at  least  twenty  should  have  been  employed. 


3IO  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

.  .  .  The  sick  lay  upon  bare  boards  or  upon  such  ragged  blankets 
as  they  possessed  without  .  .  .  any  bedding  or  even  straw.  The 
haggard  distressed  countenances  of  those  miserable,  complain- 
ing, dejected,  living  skeletons,  crying  for  medical  aid  and  food 
.  .  .  and  the  ghastly  corpses,  with  their  glazed  eyeballs  staring 
up  into  vacant  space,  with  the  flies  swarming  down  their  open 
and  grinning  mouths  and  all  over  their  ragged  clothes,  infested 
with  numerous  lice,  as  they  lay  amongst  the  sick  and  dying, 
formed  a  picture  of  helpless,  hopeless,  misery  which  it  would  be 
impossible  to  portray  by  words  or  by  the  brush.  Millions  of 
flies  swarmed  over  everything  and  covered  the  faces  of  the 
sleeping  patients  and  crawled  down  their  open  mouths  and 
deposited  their  maggots  in  the  gangrenous  wounds  of  the 
living.  .  .  .  Where  hospital  gangrene  was  prevailing  it  was 
impossible  for  any  wound  to  escape  contagion  under  these 
circumstances." 

Surgeon  Bates,  C.  S.  A.,  who  was  on  duty  for  a  number  of 
months  at  Andersonville,  gave  the  Court  his  professional 
opinion  as  follows: 

"I  feel  myself  safe  in  saying  that  seventy-five  per  cent,  of 
those  who  died  might  have  been  saved,  had  those  unfortunate 
men  been  properly  cared  for  as  to  food,  clothing,  bedding,  etc." 

General  Winder,  whose  removal  as  Superintendent  of 
Military  Prisons  was  thus  recommended  by  Colonel 
Chandler,  was  an  especial  friend  and  protege  of  Jefferson 
Davis.  He  was  never  given  command  of  troops  in  the 
field,  but  in  the  above  capacity  made  himself  notorious  by  his 
brutal  treatment  of  prisoners.  No  words  of  mine  can  more 
fittingly  describe  his  character  than  his  own  language  em- 
ployed in  his  celebrated  Order  No.  13,  issued  when  General 
Kilpatrick's  (U.  S.  A.)  command  moved  in  the  direction  of 
Andersonville.  I  give  it  without  further  comment: 

"ORDER  No.  13 

"Headquarters,  Confederate  States  Military  Prison, 

"Andersonville,  July  27,  1864. 
"The  officer  on  duty  and  in  charge  of  the  battery  of  Florida 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  31 1 

artillery  at  the  time  will,  upon  receiving  notice  that  the  enemy 
has  approached  within  seven  miles  of  this  Post,  open  fire  upon 
the  stockade,  i.  e.,  the  prison  containing  25,000  to  35,000  defence- 
less men,  with  grape-shot,  without  reference  to  the  situation 
beyond  these  lines  of  defence.  It  is  better  that  the  last  Federal 
be  exterminated  than  be  permitted  to  burn  and  pillage  the  prop- 
erty of  loyal  citizens,  as  they  will  do  if  allowed  to  make  their 
escape  from  the  prison. 
"By  order  of, 

"JOHN  H.  WINDER, 

"  Brigadier  -General. 

"W.S.  Winder, 

"Asst.Adj.-Gen." 

Before  leaving  Andersonville,  it  may  be  well  to  allude  to 
the  fate  of  its  jailer,  Captain  Wirz,  who  was  perhaps  the 
most  notorious  for  personal  brutality  among  the  many  of  his 
class  who  commanded  Southern  prisons.  I  am  led  to  speak 
of  it  because  many  of  our  younger  generation  are  ignorant 
of  the  facts,  and  because  the  women  of  Georgia  recently 
erected  a  statue  to  him  as  a  martyr.  Confirming  my  belief 
above  expressed,  so  well  informed  a  man  as  President 
Roosevelt  said  to  me  at  the  White  House  in  the  winter  of 
1908:  "Did  the  United  States  execute  any  of  the  rebels 
after  the  war?"  My  reply  was  that  we  hung  one,  but  not 
for  treason.  Wirz  was  tried  upon  the  charge  of  murder,  and 
was  convicted  of  having  killed  with  his  own  hand,  at  various 
times  in  the  Andersonville  prison,  and  in  cold  blood,  twelve 
unarmed  and  inoffensive  Union  soldiers,  and  for  these  crimes 
was  sentenced  and  hung.  Every  opportunity  for  defence 
was  given  him,  his  lawyer  and  witnesses  being  paid  by  the 
United  States. 

In  treating  of  these  matters  a  conscientious  writer  must 
often  hesitate  between  the  inadequacy  of  a  general  phrase 
to  convey  the  real  facts  and  the  apprehension  that  the  full 
and  perhaps  loathsome  detail  will  expose  him  to  the  charge 
of  bias,  exaggeration,  or  denunciation.  To  illustrate  I 
give  one  instance.  It  has  been  previously  said  that  in  these 


312  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

prisons  "the  water  was  often  impure."  What  may  this 
mean?  Let  Dr.  R.  H.  Whitfield,  surgeon,  C.  S.  A.,  in  charge 
of  the  prison  at  Cahaba,  Ala.,  tell  us.  On  March  31,  1864, 
he  reports  to  his  superior,  Surgeon  P.  B.  Scott,  C.  S.  A., 
Medical  Director: 

"When  you  know  the  sanitary  conditions  you  cannot  be 
surprised  at  the  large  number  of  cases  reported.  The  prisoners 
sleep  on  the  earth  or  on  boards,  without  straw  or  bedding  of  any 
kind.  The  wood  (less  than  half  the  regulations  allow)  is  green 
pine  or  decayed  oak.  The  water  for  drinking,  cooking,  and 
bathing  comes  along  an  open  street  gutter  for  200  yards.  In  its 
course,  it  has  been  subjected  to  the  washing  of  the  persons  of 
soldiers,  citizens,  and  negroes,  and  has  received  the  contents  of 
buckets,  tubs,  and  spittoons  from  offices  and  hospital;  the  refuse 
of  hogs,  dogs,  cows,  and  horses,  and  filth  of  all  kinds  from  the 
streets  and  other  sources." 

Of  the  prison  at  Florence,  S.  C.,  Colonel  W.  D.  Pickett, 
Inspector-General,  C.  S.  A.,  reports  to  General  Hardee, 
October  12,  1864: 

"The  condition  of  these  prisoners  has  not  been  misrepre- 
sented. They  are  emaciated  and  sickly  and  filthy  in  the  ex- 
treme. Three-fourths  are  without  blankets,  and  almost  without 
clothing.  They  have  only  the  temporary  shelters  they  have 
erected." 

Of  Columbia,  Lieutenant-Colonel  Iverson,  C.  S.  A., 
reports,  January  26,  1865,  to  Colonel  H.  Forno,  Inspector 
Military  Prisons,  C.  S.  A.:  "The  rations  are,  in  my 
judgment,  totally  insufficient  for  the  sustenance  of  the 
prisoners. " 

And  Colonel  Forno  reporting  to  General  Winder,  C.  S.  A., 
says:  "  The  subsistence  department  is  entirely  deficient,  and 
the  ration  issued  daily  amounts  almost  to  starvation. " 

Of  Salisbury,  Governor  Vance  of  North  Carolina,  writes 
to  the  Secretary  of  War,  C.  S.  A.,  February  I,  1865:  "Ac- 
counts reach  me  of  the  most  distressing  character  in  re- 
gard to  the  suffering  and  destitution  of  Federal  prisoners 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  313 

at  Salisbury;"  and  to  General  Bradley  T.  Johnson,  C.  S.  A., 
he  writes:  "If  the  half  be  true,  it  is  disgraceful  to  our 
humanity." 

General  Johnson  replies,  February  12,  1865:  "It  is  dis- 
graceful to  our  country.  A  large  per  cent,  live  in  holes 
in  the  ground.  I  have  pressed  upon  our  authorities  (at 
Richmond)  the  terrible  suffering  and  mortality  among 
them." 

Of  all  the  prisons  of  this  type  we  get  the  same  sad  pic- 
tures, all  drawn  from  Confederate  sources  and  presenting  a 
thousand  gruesome  details  of  privation,  suffering,  and  death, 
which  I  shall  not  distress  you  by  repeating. 

Such  a  discussion  cannot  be  left,  however,  without  an  at- 
tempt to  answer  two  questions:  First,  was  the  action  of  the 
South  deliberate,  intentional,  preconceived?  And  if  so,  who 
was  responsible?  After  all  these  years  we  can  surely  weigh 
the  question  judicially  and  with  fairness.  Second,  were  there 
mitigating  circumstances  to  be  urged  on  behalf  of  the  South 
which  would  render  less  vivid  this  panoramic  picture  of 
cruelty?  In  answer  to  this  it  should  be  freely  admitted  that 
something  can  be  urged  for  the  defence;  that  few  professional 
surgeons  could  be  spared  from  the  rebel  armies ;  that  surgical 
implements  and  medical  supplies  were  very  scarce;  that 
blankets  and  clothing  were  scarce;  that  all  supplies  of 
manufactured  articles,  tools,  cooking  utensils,  etc.,  were 
drained  for  their  armies;  that  fewer  crops  were  planted  and 
railroad  communications  between  the  interior  and  the  battle 
lines  were  cut  off;  that  many  of  their  army  officers  protested 
indignantly,  but  uselessly,  against  the  cruelty  they  saw 
practised,  and  that  many  Southern  citizens  joined  in  those 
protests. 

But  on  the  other  hand,  what  of  the  pine  forests  surround- 
ing these  prisons  which  our  men  were  not  allowed  to  cut  for 
fuel  or  for  shelter  ?  What  of  the  abundant  corn  fields  of  Geor- 
gia, untouched  by  war,  through  which  Sherman  marched  while 
our  men  at  Andersonville,  a  few  miles  away,  were  starving?  Is 
nothing  to  be  said  of  those  vast  supplies  from  which  at  Salis- 
bury alone,  April  12, 1865,  Sherman's  commissary  took  100,000 


314  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

bushels  of  corn,  50,000  bushels  of  wheat,  27,000  pounds 
of  rice,  20,000  pounds  of  sugar,  and  60,000  pounds  of  ba- 
con, and  of  those  in  the  neighborhood  of  Anderson ville, 
about  which  General  J.  H.  Wilson  states,  "My  command 
found  supplies  in  great  abundance."  What  of  the  sutlers 
who  kept  for  sale  near  these  prisons,  corn-meal,  bacon, 
beef,  sweet  potatoes,  beans,  onions,  pumpkins,  salt  and 
soda,  for  which,  at  enormous  cost,  the  prisoner's  remain- 
ing clothing  or  other  things  of  value,  was  exchanged  until 
he  was  naked,  destitute,  and  helpless?  What  of  the  Con- 
federate Inspector-General's  report  that  "necessary  food 
could  be  obtained  with  slight  effort"?  What  of  the  using 
for  their  own  troops  of  the  food,  the  blankets  and  the  clothing 
sent  by  our  Government,  under  solemn  stipulation  to  be 
used  for  its  captured  soldiers,  and  so  accepted  by  the  Con- 
federate Government?  What  of  the  report  of  Surgeon  Wm. 
A.  Carrington,  C.  S.  A.,  March  23, 1864,  to  the  Surgeon- 
General,  C.  S.  A.,  regarding  hospitals  in  Richmond?  It  ends 
with  these  words: 

"  Large,  well- ventilated,  and  completely  organized  hospitals 
near  the  city  have  been  empty  during  the  whole  of  this  time. 
They  were  offered  (for  the  use  of  prisoners)  and  refused  by  the 
(rebel)  authorities.  They  contained  750  beds." 

On  this  point  General  John  H.  Stibbs,  one  of  the  two 
surviving  members  of  the  Court  which  tried  Wirz,  says, 
May  30,  1910: 

"Could  these  horrors  have  been  averted?  I  reply  yes — 
scarcely  having  patience  to  answer  the  question.  This  prison 
was  located  in  one  of  the  richest  sections  of  Georgia.  Supplies 
were  abundant,  the  prison  was  surrounded  with  a  forest,  and 
yet  some  of  our  men  froze  to  death  for  lack  of  fuel  which  they 
would  gladly  have  gathered  had  they  been  permitted  to  do  so. 
Among  those  confined  in  that  stockade  were  men  possessed  of  all 
the  training  and  ability  necessary  to  construct  anything,  from  a 
log  cabin  to  a  war  ship;  and  they  would  have  considered  it  a 
privilege  to  have  done  all  the  work  necessary  to  enlarge  the 
stockade,  build  barracks,  and  provide  a  supply  of  pure  water, 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  315 

had  they  been  provided  with  tools  and  materials  and  given  the 
opportunity. " 

In  such  a  situation  the  opinion  of  an  eminent  and 
impartial  spectator  is  of  peculiar  value.  Such  we  find  in 
Gold  win  Smith's  Reminiscences  of  the  American  Civil  War, 
written  at  the  time.  He  was  an  Englishman  of  the  highest 
standing,  public  and  private,  literary  and  social.  He  was 
known  and  respected  in  two  continents.  He  approached 
the  subject,  like  most  Englishmen  of  his  day,  prepossessed 
in  favor  of  the  South.  Upon  the  point  I  have  raised  he  says : 

"  It  seemed  to  me  at  the  North,  generally,  there  was  a  remark- 
able absence  of  truculence.  Prisoners  of  war  were  well- treated. 
I  visited  the  prison  camp  at  Chicago  and  saw  that  the  inmates 
were  well-fed  and  suffering  no  hardship  beyond  that  of  con- 
finement. I  visited  the  prisoners'  hospital,  Baltimore,  and 
satisfied  myself  that  the  treatment  was  good.  My  visit  was 
unannounced.  I  record  this  as  an  answer  to  the  charges  of 
cruelty  rife  at  the  time  in  England.  It  was  the  more  notable  as 
the  treatment  of  Federal  prisoners  in  some  of  the  Confederate 
prisons  was  known  to  be  most  inhuman.  In  the  Andersonville 
prison  camp  it  was  devilish  and  such  as  no  want  of  resources  on 
the  part  of  the  captor  could  excuse.  No  laws  of  war  can  warrant 
the  retention  of  prisoners  whom  a  captor  cannot  feed.  I  saw  at 
Annapolis,  the  first  batch  of  prisoners  exchanged  from  Anderson- 
ville; they  were  living  skeletons." 

The  question  is  often  asked,  What  was  General  Lee's 
attitude  toward  prisoners  of  war?  The  answer  is  simple. 
The  prisoners,  taken  by  the  troops  under  his  immediate 
command,  were  treated  with  consideration  and  humanity 
while  in  his  charge.  But  when  they  passed  into  the  hands 
of  the  Richmond  authorities  he  ceased  to  concern  himself 
about  them.  There  is  no  evidence  discoverable  that  he  ever 
interested  himself  in  the  general  question  of  the  treatment  of 
prisoners  in  the  South,  and  at  a  time  when  his  influence  with 
the  Confederate  authorities  was  paramount,  and  when  his 
views  would  have  compelled  appropriate  action,  and  when 
the  sufferings  of  the  Federal  prisoners  were  at  their  maximum, 


316  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

we  fail  to  find  any  protest  from  his  pen,  or  the  record  of  any 
effort  on  his  part  to  ameliorate  their  condition.  That  he 
was  aware  of  it  appears  from  his  correspondence,  but  he 
seems  to  have  regarded  it  as  outside  his  province.  In  his 
correspondence  with  General  Grant  he  stands  for  negro 
slavery  and  distinctly  approves  the  Confederate  policy  of 
refusing  to  exchange  our  negro  soldiers,  saying  in  substance 
that  in  agreeing  to  an  exchange  cartel  he  had  omitted  to  say 
that  it  could  not  include  former  slaves,  who  would  not  be 
regarded  by  him  as  soldiers ;  and  he  approved  the  suspension 
of  exchanges,  with  all  its  horrible  consequences  to  both 
sides,  rather  than  to  yield  on  this  issue.  How  far  he  felt 
himself  bound  in  this  regard  by  the  action  of  the  Confederate 
Congress  and  Davis's  proclamation,  and  whether  these  were 
in  accord  or  conflict  with  his  own  convictions,  we  can  only 
surmise.  So  far  as  we  can  learn  from  his  official  record,  he 
acquiesced  and  approved.  The  fact  that  he  was  the  one 
conspicuous  military  figure  in  the  capture  of  John  Brown  at 
Harper's  Ferry,  and  in  his  subsequent  execution,  throws  a 
side  light  upon  his  view  of  slavery,  and  in  a  measure  is 
corroborative  of  the  opinion  above  expressed. 

To  the  much-mooted  question,  What  were  the  total 
losses  by  death  among  prisoners  North  and  South?  it  must 
be  answered  that  no  even  approximate  estimate  has  been  or 
ever  can  be  truthfully  made.  The  necessary  data  is  lacking. 
The  records  of  the  Northern  prisons  were  regularly  kept, 
have  been  preserved,  and  are  accessible.  But  in  the  South 
no  regular  systematic  records  were  kept  in  most  instances, 
and  such  reports  as  were  made  covered  irregular  and  widely 
separated  periods.  Even  of  these,  few  have  been  preserved. 
Andersonville,  Ga.,  forms,  apparently,  the  one  exception 
to  this.  The  records  of  this,  the  most  notorious  of  the  stock- 
ade or  open-air  prisons,  were  kept  during  1864  (the  year  of 
greatest  congestion  of  numbers  and  maximum  deaths), 
by  a  Federal  prisoner  detailed  for  that  purpose,  and  were 
recovered  from  the  rebel  archives  at  Richmond.  Yet  while 
they  present  continuity  and  system,  they  fall  far  short  of 
accuracy.  Surgeon  White,  C.  S.  A.,  in  charge,  and  the 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  317 

inspector-generals  who,  from  time  to  time,  visited  and 
reported  upon  the  condition  of  the  prisoners,  all  repeat  the 
statement  that  of  the  hundred  and  odd  bodies,  amounting  in 
August,  1864,  to  an  average  of  130  a  day,  which  were  carried 
out  each  morning  for  burial  in  a  common  trench,  "hundreds 
had  never  been  seen  by  any  surgeon  or  recorded  in  any  way. " 
An  attempt  has  been  made  by  counting  graves,  and  again  by 
deducting  the  number  released  from  the  number  supposed 
to  have  been  received,  to  establish  a  balance  representing  the 
dead;  but  in  the  absence  of  any  approximately  reliable 
record  of  those  received,  and  in  view  of  the  method  employed, 
viz.,  the  hasty  interment  of  hundreds  of  bodies,  piled  one 
upon  another  in  a  common  trench,  it  is  clearly  apparent 
that  such  efforts  and  calculations,  made  after  a  long  lapse  of 
time,  are  utterly  futile  for  the  purpose  of  affording  any 
reliable  basis  of  calculation.  When  we  join  to  this  the  fact 
that,  after  eliminating  the  smaller  places,  there  were  thirty- 
four  principal  prisons  in  the  South,  located  all  the  way  from 
Richmond,  Va.,  to  the  southern  confines  of  Texas,  that  these 
were  abandoned  and  broken  up  and  their  inhabitants  sent 
elsewhere  as  our  troops  swept  over  one  part  of  the  South  after 
another  during  the  last  months  of  the  war,  that  the  rebel 
authorities  were  seeking  their  own  safety  and  had  no  interest 
in  the  preservation  of  records  which  would  be  self -condemna- 
tory, it  needs  no  argument  to  establish  the  fact  that  the 
number  of  deaths  of  Union  soldiers  in  Southern  prisons  can 
never  be  known,  and  that  any  estimate  based  upon  the 
fragmentary  data  accessible  must  be  many  thousands 
below  the  reality. 

The  careful  historian,  analyzing  the  records  of  those  times, 
is  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  a  wide  difference  existed 
between  the  feeling  of  the  South  toward  the  Northern  soldier, 
and  that  of  the  North  toward  the  Southern  one.  To  this 
difference  was  due  in  large  measure  the  marked  contrast 
in  the  treatment  of  prisoners  by  the  two  contending  parties, 
the  facts  of  which  are  now  established  beyond  controversy. 

As  no  reasonable  man  would  claim  that  the  Southern 
portion  of  our  people  were  inherently  vindictive  and  cruel, 


31 8  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

it  follows  that  some  especial  and  powerful  influences  had 
been  and  were,  at  the  beginning  of  the  war,  at  work, 
to  engender  among  them  the  characteristics  alluded  to, 
which  were  so  constantly  and  generally  displayed  toward 
those  of  our  men  who  were  placed  helpless  in  their  hands, 
during  the  four  years  that  followed.  To  ascertain  what  these 
influences  were,  to  lay  bare  the  cause  behind  the  fact,  is 
manifestly  germane  to  this  whole  subject,  and  necessary  to  a 
complete  understanding  of  it.  In  what  follows,  therefore, 
I  have  tried  to  outline  briefly  the  source  and  character  of 
these  influences  which  poisoned  the  otherwise  generous 
natures  of  a  whole  people;  the  methods  adopted  by  the 
Southern  leaders  to  carry  out  their  purposes;  and  something 
of  the  effect  produced  by  these  efforts. 

It  is  difficult  at  all  times  to  analyze  thought  in  others  and 
to  define  motive,  and  it  is  unsafe  to  generalize  decidedly  or 
dogmatically  as  to  the  impulse  that  has  moved  great  masses 
of  men  toward  a  common  object,  but  referring  to  the  North- 
ern soldier,  it  is  entirely  safe  to  say  that  in  a  vast  majority 
of  cases  he  enlisted  to  help  "save  the  Union"  or  "to  put  down 
the  rebellion,"  as  he  phrased  it,  i.  e.t  to  re-establish  the 
national  supremacy,  to  recover  its  forts  and  dockyards,  and 
to  make  its  flag  once  more  respected.  His  impulse  was 
impersonal,  a  sentiment,  if  you  please,  and  even  during  the 
period  before  described  in  this  paper,  when  the  events  of 
three  years  of  bloody  and  indecisive  war  had  excited  an- 
tagonisms to  the  highest  possible  pitch,  his  feeling  never  de- 
generated into  a  personal  animosity  toward  his  Southern  foe. 
His  enemy,  the  "Johnny  Reb,"  continued  to  be  the  brave 
soldier,  the  gallant  antagonist,  to  the  end  of  the  chapter. 
While  he  attacked  the  defenders  of  Secession  with  a  crusader's 
zeal,  it  was  the  Cause  they  advocated  which  he  sought  to 
destroy,  and  no  racial  hatred,  no  personal  antipathy,  added 
its  bitterness  to  the  blows  he  dealt. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Union  soldier  was  regarded  by  the 
South  as  an  invader,  as  one  come  to  free  the  slaves,  as  a 
destroyer  of  homes  and  property,  and  as  a  ravisher  of  women. 
The  leaders  and  makers  of  public  opinion  in  the  South,  the 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  319 

Confederate  Congress,  President  Davis,  and  the  public 
press,  used  every  influence  of  spoken  and  printed  argument 
to  force  and  impress  this  conviction  indelibly  upon  the  minds 
of  their  people,  and  so,  in  their  own  apt  phrase,  to  "fire  the 
Southern  heart." 

To  escape  the  responsibility  of  their  own  initiative  in  be- 
ginning hostilities,  and  seizing  the  properties  of  the  United 
States,  the  Confederate  leaders  planted  and  sedulously 
cultivated  in  the  minds  of  the  Southern  people  the  belief, 
growing  to  a  conviction,  that  the  North  meant  conquest  and 
subjugation.  This  accounts  in  a  great  degree  for  the  brutal- 
ity of  expression  toward  our  officers  and  men  so  constantly 
found  in  these  records  and  for  the  approval  with  which  the 
South  as  a  whole  acquiesced  in  the  treatment  of  prisoners 
that  I  have  described. 

My  personal  experience  leads  me  to  say  gladly  that  this 
perverted  view  of  the  Union  soldier  was  held  in  far  less  degree 
by  the  Confederate  soldier  at  the  front  than  by  the  politi- 
cian, the  editor,  and  the  civilian,  male  and  female,  in  the  rear. 

To  show  that  this  picture  is  not  overdrawn,  a  few  illus- 
trations, selected  at  random  from  a  mass  of  material,  will 
suffice. 

Typical  of  this  purpose  is  the  speech  of  Roger  A.  Pryor  in 
Richmond,  April  10,  1861.  He  said: 

"Gentlemen,  I  thank  you  especially  that  you  have  at  last 
annihilated  this  accursed  Union,  reeking  with  corruption  and 
insolent  with  excess  of  tyranny.  Not  only  is  it  gone,  but  gone 
forever.  For  my  part  if  Abraham  Lincoln  and  Hannibal  Hamlin 
to-morrow  were  to  abdicate  their  offices  and  were  to  give  me  a 
sheet  of  blank  paper  to  write  the  conditions  of  re-annexation  to 
the  defunct  Union,  I  would  scornfully  spurn  the  overture.  Do 
not  distrust  Virginia.  As  sure  as  to-morrow's  sun  will  rise,  just 
so  sure  will  Virginia  be  a  member  of  this  Southern  Confederation. 
And  I  will  tell  you,  gentlemen,  what  will  put  her  there  in  less  than 
an  hour  by  Shrewsbury  clock,  strike  a  blow.  The  very  moment 
that  blood  is  shed  Old  Virginia  will  make  common  cause  with 
her  sisters  of  the  South." 

And  this, — Hon.  Jeremiah  Clemens,  U.  S.  Senator  from 


320  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

Alabama,  when  the  State  seceded,  said  to  the  convention 
at  Huntsville,  Ala.,  March  13,  1864: 

"I  will  tell  you  how  your  State  was  got  out  of  the  Union. 
In  1 86 1,  when  the  seat  of  the  Confederate  Government  was  in 
Montgomery,  I  met  in  the  office  of  General  Walker,  then  Con- 
federate Secretary  of  War,  Jefferson  Davis  with  Memminger  and 
Benjamin,  of  his  cabinet,  Gilchrist,  a  member  of  our  State  Legis- 
lature, and  a  number  of  other  prominent  gentlemen.  They  were 
discussing  the  propriety  of  immediately  opening  fire  on  Fort 
Sumter,  to  which  General  Walker  was  opposed.  Mr.  Gilchrist 
said  to  him:  'Sir,  unless  you  sprinkle  blood  in  the  face  of  the 
people  of  Alabama,  they  will  be  back  in  the  old  Union  in  less  than 
ten  days.'  The  next  day,  the  I2th  of  April  (though  Major 
Anderson  had  agreed  to  surrender  on  the  I5th)  Beauregard  was 
ordered  to  open  his  batteries  on  Sumter,  and  Alabama  was 
saved  to  the  Confederacy. " 

Lying  before  me  as  I  write  is  a  copy  of  the  Richmond 
Dispatch  of  Friday,  March  31,  1865.  I  obtained  it  in  Rich- 
mond while  a  prisoner  and  brought  it  away  with  me,  its 
only  interest  to  me  at  that  time  being  the  account  of  a  recent 
battle  near  Petersburg.  The  Dispatch  and  the  Examiner 
were  the  two  leading  dailies  of  that  city.  Coming  from  the 
seat  of  government,  they  were  widely  circulated  and  read 
throughout  the  South,  and  their  editorials  carried  all  the 
weight  of  official  inspiration.  From  the  editorial  columns 
on  the  front  page  of  the  Dispatch  I  quote: 

"The  object  of  the  Yankees  in  waging  the  kind  of  war  they 
are  now  engaged  in  carrying  on  against  us,  could  not  be  mistaken. 
It  is  no  longer  a  restoration  of  the  Union  that  they  seek.  That 
was  from  the  first  a  mere  pretense,  used  to  cover  designs  which, 
at  one  time,  it  might  not  have  been  quite  so  prudent  to  expose 
as  they  believe  it  to  be  now.  The  universal  belief  among  them 
is,  that  they  are  on  the  point  of  completing  our  subjugation,  and 
that  it  is,  therefore,  no  longer  required  by  prudence  to  make  a 
mystery  of  the  fate  they  design  for  us.  That  fate  is  simply  the 
utmost  degree  of  degradation  which  their  ingenuity,  prompted  by 
their  malice,  can  devise.  They  will  not  be  content  with  merely 
beating  us  into  surrender.  We  must  suffer  all  the  horrors  of 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  321 

conquest  ever  heretofore  put  in  practice  against  a  defeated  foe, 
with  the  addition  of  new  ones,  devised  for  the  especial  gratifica- 
tion of  their  hatred.  That  hatred  is  a  passion  universal  among 
the  whole  Yankee  nation.  There  are  so  few  bosoms  not  agitated 
by  it  that  they  scarcely  serve  for  an  exception  to  the  general 
rule.  It  began  long  before  this  war,  and  any  one  who  attributes 
the  unheard-of  enormities  which  have  marked  its  progress  to  the 
disposition  on  the  part  of  all  armies  to  commit  excesses  will 
be  very  much  mistaken.  It  arises  from  the  long,  deep-rooted 
hatred,  to  which  we  have  alluded,  and  which  is  now  presented 
with  an  opportunity  of  gratifying  itself.  Our  cities  are  wantonly 
burnt,  and  our  population  insulted  and  murdered,  upon  principle. 
It  is  the  result  of  cold-blooded  calculation,  not  of  military  pas- 
sions, stimulated  by  resistance.  These  soldiers  are  turned  loose 
upon  a  population  which  they  hate,  and  they  are  told  to  do  their 
worst,  for  they  will  rather  be  applauded  than  punished  for  any 
crime  they  may  perpetrate. 

"  Such  being  the  treatment  our  people  receive  while  we  have 
large  armies  still  in  the  field,  what  are  we  to  expect  when  resis- 
tance shall  have  ceased  altogether?  The  Yankees  themselves 
tell  us  a  part  of  what  we  are  to  look  for,  but  they  do  not  tell  us 
all.  We  must  look  for  it  in  their  acts.  In  Charleston,  they 
have  not  only  set  the  negroes  free,  but,  as  far  as  they  have  been 
able,  have  compelled  the  whites  to  associate  with  them.  They 
do  this  because  they  know  that  the  whites  consider  such  associa- 
tion as  degrading  to  them;  and  they  are  determined  to  make  them 
drink  the  cup  to  the  dregs.  There  are  probably  among  us 
Southern  people  who  are  tired  of  the  war,  and  who  hope  that, 
by  submission,  they  may  obtain  a  little  mercy  at  the  hands  of 
their  masters.  Never  were  people  more  woefully  deceived.  The 
Yankee  will  have  no  mercy  upon  them.  He  is  only  forbearing 
when  he  finds  his  proposed  victim  in  a  condition  and  disposition 
to  resist.  Let  him  but  once  be  at  his  mercy — completely  in  his 
power — incapable  of  further  resistance — and  he  might  as  well 
hope  for  mercy  from  a  tiger,  or  compassion  from  a  wolf,  or 
forbearance  from  any  other  cruel  and  cowardly  wild  beast  of 
the  forest.  The  Yankee  will  not  only  strip  his  victim  of  every- 
thing he  has  in  the  world,  down  to  the  very  clothes  upon  his  back, 
but  he  will  take  every  other  means  to  make  him  feel  his  situation. 
Is  it  not  better  to  continue  to  resist  even  unto  death  than  to 
accept  such  a  peace  as  this? 


322  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

"Our  'Northern  brethren'  of  the  Puritan  persuasion  are 
happily  endowed  with  the  felicitous  quality  of  always  looking 
at  the  bright  side  of  their  own  character  and  actions.  For  ex- 
ample, we  suppose  that  between  them  and  the  rest  of  the  Chris- 
tian world  there  would  not  be  one  moment's  dispute  about  the 
practical  duties  of  Christianity.  They  would  not  deny  that 
forgiveness  of  enemies  is  the  peculiar  and  cardinal  virtue  of  the 
Christian  religion;  that  the  man  who  does  not  show  mercy  to 
others  can  expect  no  mercy  from  God.  They  will  argue  that  the 
rules  of  civilization,  let  alone  Christianity,  do  not  permit  any 
barbarities  in  warfare  not  essential  to  the  end  for  which  war  is 
waged.  And  yet,  the  community  which  holds  these  excellent 
principles  is  not  aware  of  any  inconsistency  between  their  faith 
and  practice  when  they  exult  in  the  deadly  hate  that  they  bear 
the  South  as  if  it  were  a  first-class  virtue;  when  they  pant  for 
our  extermination;  when  they  rejoice  to  read  accounts  in  their 
daily  papers  of  the  Southern  farmhouses  and  towns  that  have 
been  burned  to  the  ground;  of  the  defenceless  women  and 
children  that  have  been  turned  out-of-doors,  and  exposed  to 
destruction,  and  sometimes  worse;  of  the  prospect  of  starving 
to  death  whole  communities  of  innocent  people;  of  prisoners 
dying  miserably  of  cruel  treatment,  or  cold,  or  famine.  Nay, 
their  very  preachers  get  up  in  the  pulpit,  and,  Sunday  after 
Sunday,  invoke  their  hearers  to  rain  fire  and  brimstone  upon  the 
accursed  rebels,  and  to  spare  none  of  the  infernal  crew." 

Within  two  weeks  after  this  publication,  Grant  had 
received  Lee's  surrender,  had  simultaneously  issued  20,000 
rations  to  the  nearly  starving  soldiers  of  the  Confederate 
army,  and  had  announced  the  order  which  has  become  his- 
toric for  its  magnanimity,  granting  them  their  horses  and 
guaranteeing  them  peace  and  protection  in  their  homes. 
Shortly  before  this  our  troops  had  entered  Richmond, 
extinguished  the  fires  lighted  by  the  evacuating  rebels 
among  the  hospitals  holding  their  wounded,  and  the  houses 
of  the  inhabitants,  had  issued  rations  to  women  and  children, 
and  had  assured  protection  from  want  and  from  insult  to  all 
the  defenceless  people  of  the  city. 

On  the  1 8th  of  July,  1863,  Colonel  Robert  G.  Shaw  was 
killed  while  leading  his  men  of  the  54th  Massachusetts  in  an 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  323 

attack  on  Fort  Wagner,  near  Charleston,  South  Carolina. 
The  54th  was  the  first  "colored"  regiment  that  entered  the 
United  States  service  and  was  recruited  from  among  the 
citizens  of  negro  lineage  residing  in  the  Bay  State.  Colonel 
Shaw's  parents,  advanced  in  years,  and  whom  I  knew  well, 
lived  on  Staten  Island,  N.  Y.  Hearing  of  their  son's  death 
and  wishing  to  recover  his  body,  they  communicated  with 
the  authorities  at  Washington  to  learn  what  disposition  had 
been  made  of  it  after  the  battle.  Our  Government  forwarded 
the  inquiry  through  the  official  Confederate  channels,  and 
in  due  time  came  a  refusal  from  the  authorities  at  Charleston 
to  attempt  to  identify  or  return  .the  body,  and  this  explana- 
tory message :  "We  buried  him  in  the  ditch  with  his  niggers." 
The  reply  of  Colonel  Shaw's  parents,  as  published  in  the 
press  of  that  day,  was  simply  that  their  son's  body  could  not 
have  a  nobler  burial  than  among  those  of  his  devoted  men, 
and  an  eminent  writer  has  said:  "What  was  intended  as  a 
disgrace  will,  in  the  light  of  history,  be  regarded  as  a  monu- 
mental honor. " 

Contrast  this  attitude  of  the  Southern  civil  authorities 
with  that  of  the  Southern  soldier.  On  the  evening  of  Sep- 
tember i,  1862,  General  Philip  Kearny,  U.  S.  A.,  was  killed 
in  the  battle  of  Chantilly,  Virginia.  On  the  following  morn- 
ing General  Lee  sent  the  body  under  an  escort  and  flag  of 
truce  into  the  Union  lines.  It  was  fully  accoutred  with 
uniform  and  sabre,  as  at  the  time  of  Kearny's  death,  and 
was  accompanied  by  the  horse  he  had  been  riding,  also  fully 
accoutred.  In  his  letter  to  the  Union  general,  General  Lee 
said  in  substance,  that  it  gave  him  pleasure  to  send  at  once 
and  with  great  respect  the  body  and  the  horse  of  General 
Kearny,  a  very  gallant  soldier,  feeling  that  the  possession 
of  them  might  be  some  consolation  to  General  Kearny's 
widow  with  whom  he  sympathized  in  her  great  loss. 

I  have  more  than  once  before  this  audience  opposed  the 
erection  of  a  statue  to  General  Lee  in  the  Statuary  Hall  of 
the  House  of  Representatives  at  Washington,  on  the  broad 
grounds  that  he  was  not  a  patriot,  was  not  true  to  his  oath 
and  his  country  at  the  crucial  moment,  and  that  no  other 


324  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

than  loyal  men  should  receive  national  commemoration. 
I  still  hold  this  view  and  holding  it  feel  an  especial  pleasure 
in  recording  this  tribute  to  General  Lee's  gallantry  and 
courtesy  as  a  soldier,  and  his  humanity  and  sympathy  as  a 
man.  Probably  no  man  among  the  millions,  North  and 
South,  was  more  torn  by  conflicting  emotions,  or  more  un- 
decided as  to  his  course  up  to  the  last  moment,  than  Robert 
E.  Lee.  He  wrote  his  son  that  he  did  not  believe  in  a  con- 
stitutional right  of  secession,  and  saw  nothing  on  the  part 
of  the  North  that  justified  it ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  he  told 
General  Scott,  that  his  lands  and  his  slaves  were  all  he  had  to 
leave  his  children,  and  if  his  State  seceded  and  he  did  not 
join  it,  he  would  lose  all.  The  latter  influence  unhappily 
prevailed. 

These  leaders  studiously  concealed  from  the  Southern 
people  the  conciliatory  attitude  of  President  Lincoln,  as 
shown  by  his  first  inaugural  and  by  his  speeches,  and  the 
real  intent,  the  preservation  of  the  "Union  as  it  was,"  with 
which  the  North  took  up  arms.  Lest  this  be  questioned  let 
Lincoln  speak  for  himself, — and  in  speaking  for  himself  he 
speaks  for  the  North  as  a  whole. 

In  his  first  inaugural  he  says  to  the  South : 

"  In  your  hands,  my  dissatisfied  fellow  countrymen,  and  not 
in  mine  is  the  momentous  issue  of  civil  war.  The  Government 
will  not  assail  you.  You  can  have  no  conflict  without  being 
yourselves  the  aggressors." 

Such  were  his  sentiments  in  1861.  What  were  they  in 
1865?  In  February  of  that  year  three  Confederate  commis- 
sioners, Alexander  H.  Stephens  of  Georgia,  Vice-President 
of  the  Confederacy,  and  R.  M.  T.  Hunter  and  Campbell  of 
Virginia,  members  of  the  Confederate  Congress,  entered  the 
lines  of  the  1st  Division  of  the  9th  Army  Corps  (upon 
whose  headquarters  staff  I  was  serving)  in  front  of  Peters- 
burg tinder  flag  of  truce.  They  were  escorted  to  City  Point, 
where  Mr.  Lincoln  received  them  at  General  Grant's  head- 
quarters. The  conference  was  long  and,  as  it  proved,  fruit- 
less, but  as  it  was  about  to  close,  Lincoln,  unwilling  to  believe 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR  325 

that  peace  was  impossible,  drew  toward  him  a  sheet  of  paper 
and  said,  "Stephens,  let  me  write  the  word  'Union'  at  the 
top  of  that  paper  and  you  may  fill  in  as  you  please  the  terms 
of  peace  that  are  to  follow. " 

The  foregoing  quotations  and  incidents  are  not  recited 
for  the  purpose  of  again  arousing,  at  this  late  day,  indignant 
comment  or  denunciation  of  the  acts  and  thoughts  they 
reveal.  They  are  introduced  here  simply  for  their  historical 
value  and  are  submitted  as  incontrovertible  evidence  of 
what  has  been  asserted  above  in  regard  to  the  view  of  the 
Union  soldier  propagated  by  the  Southern  leaders  and  press, 
and  the  feeling  that  existed  toward  him  on  the  part  of  the 
great  mass  of  the  Southern  people  fifty  years  ago.  I 
hazard  little  in  asserting  that  no  parallel  can  be  found  for 
them  upon  the  Union  side  of  the  controversy.  The  simple 
facts  are  that  the  Confederate  leaders  brought  on  the  se- 
cession movement  to  perpetuate  human  slavery,  which  they 
believed  to  be  threatened  by  the  increasing  voting  power  in 
national  affairs  of  the  Northern  States.  The  difference  of 
constitutional  interpretation  was  in  no  sense  a  cause,  but 
was  appealed  to  by  them  as  a  partial  justification  of  what,  for 
the  above  reason,  they  had  determined  to  do,  as  shown  by 
scores  of  their  letters  prior  to  the  war  and  now  public  prop- 
erty. They  did  not  intend  war,  but  prepared  for  it,  and 
finding  they  could  not  carry  their  States  with  them  otherwise, 
they  declared  and  began  it,  persuading  their  people  that  in  so 
doing,  they  only  anticipated  what  the  North  intended.  It  is 
true,  as  often  asserted  by  Southern  writers,  that  the  bulk 
of  the  Southern  army  did  not  knowingly  fight  to  perpetuate 
slavery,  and  supposed  they  were  defending  their  threatened 
liberties,  but  it  is  equally  certain  that  they  were  deceived  by 
their  trusted  leaders  at  the  outset  and  throughout  the  war. 
The  sowing  and  cultivating  of  that  feeling  by  deliberate 
misrepresentation  of  the  attitude  of  the  North,  of  President 
Lincoln  and  of  the  Union  soldier,  with  the  great  war  it 
engendered,  constitute  a  crime  against  humanity,  unequalled 
for  its  magnitude  and  the  suffering  involved,  and  for  this 
the  Southern  leaders  must  answer  at  the  bar  of  history. 


326  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

Equally  certain  is  it  that  the  chief  responsibility  for  their 
prison  policy  must  finally  rest  with  the  political  leaders  of 
the  Rebellion,  Jefferson  Davis,  and  his  associates,  and  upon 
the  Confederate  Congress,  a  Congress  which  approved  the 
placing  of  a  mine  charged  with  gunpowder  under  Libby 
Prison,  as  stated  in  the  report  of  their  joint  select  committee 
of  the  two  Houses,  March  3,  1865.  These  political  authori- 
ties unquestionably  favored  a  policy  which  depleted  the 
Union  forces  by  the  death  of  their  men  and  the  return  of 
helpless  invalids  in  the  exchanges.  I  say  '  unquestionably ' 
because  the  Confederate  State  papers  avow  it.  They  found 
isolated  instances  of  army  officers  and  civilians  willing  to 
be  their  tools  in  carrying  out  this  policy,  and  the  general 
feeling  of  the  South,  already  described,  sustained  them  in  the 
results  attained,  while,  perhaps,  not  chargeable  with  know- 
ledge of  the  full  measure  of  the  crimes  they  perpetrated. 
The  contrasts  that  have  been  thus  presented  have  been 
offered,  not  to  arouse  sectional  feeling  and  not  in  a  vindic- 
tive spirit,  but  in  the  belief  that  the  truth  should  be  made 
a  matter  of  record;  that  justice  should  be  done  to  the  North 
for  the  way  she  played  her  part  and,  that  those  to  whom  these 
great  wrongs  were  due  should,  with  equal  justice,  be  placed 
face  to  face  with  the  record  they  created. 

NOTE 

Since  this  address  was  made,  the  subject  has  been  somewhat 
elaborately  treated  in  the  publication  entitled  The  Photographic 
History  of  the  Civil  War.  The  seventh  volume  of  this  work  is 
devoted  to  " Prisoners  and  Hospitals."  It  has  been  edited  by 
Professor  Holland  Thompson  of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York,  and  much  of  the  material  was  collected  and  many  of  the 
chapters  written  by  him. 

I  have  carefully  examined  his  work  and  gladly  testify  that  it 
bears  evidence  throughout  of  an  earnest  effort,  quoting  his  own 
words,  "to  be  absolutely  just  and  impartial."  That  it  fails  in 
my  judgment,  in  some  essential  points  to  be  so,  is  due  chiefly 
to  inherent  conditions,  which  I  pointed  out  to  him,  but  of  the 
force  of  which  he  was,  and  probably  still  is,  unaware.  This  Note 


PRISONERS  OF  WAR 


327 


is  not  the  place  to  refute  with  detailed  evidence  the  conclusions 
and  generalizations  which  I  believe  to  be  erroneous,  but  their 
general  line  may  be  indicated. 

Professor  Thompson  undertook,  with  high  motives,  what  was 
for  him  an  impossible  task.  He  labored,  at  the  outset,  under  two 
practically  insurmountable  difficulties.  He  is  less  than  forty 
years  of  age,  and  he  is  a  native  of  North  Carolina.  His  knowl- 
edge of  the  war  is  therefore  derived  entirely  at  second-hand, 
and  his  viewpoint,  both  from  inheritance  and  environment  is 
the  Southern  one,  the  only  one  in  fact  which  he  could  hold  or 
make  public  without  being  ostracized  by  relations  and  friends 
and  by  the  community  to  which  he  belonged. 

He  started,  perhaps  unconsciously  to  himself,  with  certain 
pre-conceived  theories,  and  his  labors  have  been  in  great  measure 
directed  toward  finding  evidence  to  sustain  them.  These  theories 
were,  briefly,  that  there  was  no  striking  dissimilarity  between  the 
treatment  of  prisoners  in  the  North  and  in  the  South;  that  such 
favorable  difference  as  existed  in  the  North  was  due  to  its  greater 
resources;  and  that  nothing  which  could  be  characterized,  truly, 
as  inhumanity  or  barbarity  was  shown  by  the  South. 

He  further  tries  by  the  misleading  method  of  percentages  to 
prove  that  the  ratio  of  deaths  in  certain  northern  prisons  exceeded 
the  ratio  in  any  Southern  prison.  The  fallacy  of  this  argument  is 
twofold.  Percentages  to  be  valuable  require  equal  numbers  of 
men  and  equal  continuity  of  death  rate,  two  conditions  not  met 
by  his  illustration.  For  example,  the  fact  that  of  two  men,  in 
any  prison,  one  died  the  first  week,  thereby  producing  a  death 
rate  of  fifty  per  cent,  per  week,  is  worthless  statistically,  if 
contrasted  with  the  fact  that  in  another  prison  out  of  a  total  of 
30,000  prisoners,  15,000  died  during  a  period  of  from  six  months 
to  a  year.  Again,  no  records  worth  naming  exist  of  the  great 
majority  of  Southern  prisons,  even  the  Anderson ville  1864  record 
of  deaths  being  admittedly  far  short  of  the  real  mortality,  hence 
his  conclusion  is  unwarranted  for  lack  of  data  to  substantiate  it. 

In  laboring  thus  to  sustain  a  theory,  apparent  in  his  writing 
to  any  thoughtful  reader,  he  is  led  into  the  further  error,  unwill- 
ingly no  doubt,  of  omitting  or  minimizing  the  incriminating 
evidence  and  enlarging  on  that  which  favors  his  conception. 
For  instance,  on  page  80,  he  mentions  the  report  of  Lieutenant- 
Colonel  Chandler,  C.  S.  A.,  upon  conditions  at  Anderson  ville 
as  clear  and  dispassionate,  but  he  fails  to  quote  any  part  of  it. 


328  PRISONERS  OF  WAR 

Extracts  from  this  famous  report  of  the  Confederate  Inspec- 
tor-General are  to  be  found  in  my  address.  It  is  moderate  in 
tone  and  merits  the  characterization  of  trustworthiness  which  Pro- 
fessor Thompson  has  given  to  it.  But  its  substance  is  a  descrip- 
tion of  the  horrible  conditions  which  this  officer  saw,  and  it  closes 
with  a  very  severe  criticism,  almost  denunciation,  of  the  execu- 
tive officers  in  charge,  and  of  the  Confederate  officials  of  high 
rank  who  permitted  such  conditions  to  exist.  It  would  seem,  in 
the  interest  of  fairness  and  partiality,  that  Professor  Thompson 
should  have  quoted  the  salient  features  of  this  report,  as  it  has  a 
marked  bearing  upon  the  mooted  question  of  whether  inhumanity 
and  barbarism  were  exhibited  toward  Union  prisoners  in  the 
South. 

Again,  the  killing  of  Union  prisoners  after  surrender  he  dis- 
misses in  six  lines  on  page  174,  with  slight  comment,  indicating 
incredulity,  in  the  face  of  much  confirmatory  evidence  and  official 
Confederate  documents  authorizing  and  approving  the  practice 
under  specified  conditions. 

The  official  correspondence  of  those  in  charge  of  Northern 
prisons  is  complete  and  accessible  and  their  criticisms  of  defects 
and  earnest  efforts  at  improvement  are  made  the  basis  for  a 
somewhat  general  condemnation  by  him  of  conditions  in  Northern 
prisons;  but  such  records  are  generally  lacking  with  regard  to 
Southern  prisons,  and  therefore,  with  a  few  notable  exceptions, 
these  are  spared  criticism. 

Many  more  instances  could  be  adduced,  indicating  the  un- 
conscious bias  I  have  alluded  to  above,  which  pervades  the 
work  of  Professor  Thompson,  but  enough  has  been  said  to  register 
a  protest  against  the  acceptance,  as  history,  of  many  of  his  con- 
clusions, while  every  effort  has  been  made  to  express  this  honest 
difference  of  opinion  in  language  which  would  in  no  way  reflect 
upon  his  entire  sincerity  of  purpose. 


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